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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/17655-8.txt b/17655-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..926d889 --- /dev/null +++ b/17655-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3945 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Observations of an Orderly, by Ward Muir + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Observations of an Orderly + Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital + + +Author: Ward Muir + + + +Release Date: February 1, 2006 [eBook #17655] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OBSERVATIONS OF AN ORDERLY*** + + +E-text prepared by Suzanne Lybarger, Irma Spehar, and the Project +Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/) from +page images generously made available by Internet Archive/Canadian +Libraries (http://www.archive.org/details/toronto) + + + +Note: Images of the original pages are available through + Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries. See + http://www.archive.org/details/observationsorderly00muiruoft + + + + + +OBSERVATIONS OF AN ORDERLY + +Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital + +by + +L.-CPL. WARD MUIR, R.A.M.C. (T.) + + + + + + + +Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, +Kent & Co., Ltd., 4 Stationers' +Hall Court : : : London, E.C.4 +Copyright +First published July 1917 + + + + +Novels by the Author of "Observations of an Orderly" + +THE AMAZING MUTES +WHEN WE ARE RICH +CUPID'S CATERERS + +Also Editor of + +"HAPPY--THOUGH WOUNDED" + The Book of the Third London General Hospital + + + + +TO + +LT.-COL. H.E. BRUCE PORTER, C.M.G. + +OFFICER IN COMMAND OF THE + +3RD LONDON + +GENERAL HOSPITAL + + + + +Some passages from _Observations of an Orderly_ have appeared, +generally in a shorter form, in _The Spectator_, _The New Statesman_, +_The Hospital_, _The Evening Standard_, _The National News_, _The Dundee +Advertiser_, _The Daily News_, and _The Daily Mail_. The author desires +to make the usual acknowledgments to their editors. + +The coloured design on the paper wrapper is by Sergeant Noël Irving, +R.A.M.C. (T.), a member of the unit at the 3rd London General Hospital. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +I PAGE +MY FIRST DAY 19 + +II +LIFE IN THE ORDERLIES' HUTS 33 + +III +WASHING-UP 51 + +IV +A "HUT" HOSPITAL 65 + +V +FROM THE "D BLOCK" WARDS 79 + +VI +WHEN THE WOUNDED ARRIVE 93 + +VII +"T.... A...." 107 + +VIII +LAUNDRY PROBLEMS 121 + +IX +ON BUTTONS 137 + +X +A WORD ABOUT "SLACKERS IN KHAKI" 147 + +XI +THE RECREATION ROOMS 159 + +XII +THE COCKNEY 173 + +XIII +THE STATION PARTY 201 + +XIV +SLANG IN A WAR HOSPITAL 219 + +XV +A BLIND MAN'S HOME-COMING 235 + + + + +I + +MY FIRST DAY + + +The sergeant in charge of the clothing store was curt. He couldn't help +it: he had run short of tunics, also of "pants"--except three pairs +which wouldn't fit me, wouldn't fit anybody, unless we enlisted three +very fat dwarfs: he had kept on asking for tunics and pants, and they'd +sent him nothing but great-coats and water-bottles: I could take his +word for it, he wished he was at the Front, he did, instead of in this +blessed hole filling in blessed forms for blessed clothes which never +came. Impossible, anyhow, to rig me out. I was going on duty, was I? +Then I must go on duty in my "civvies." + +It was a disappointment. Your new recruit feels that no small item of +his reward is the privilege of beholding himself in khaki. The escape +from civilian clothes was, at that era, one of the prime lures to +enlistment. I had attempted to escape before, and failed. Now at last I +had found a branch of the army which would accept me. It needed my +services instantly. I was to start work at once. Nothing better. I was +ready. This was what I had been seeking for months past. But--I confess +it--I had always pictured myself dressed as a soldier. The postponement +of this bright vision for even twenty-four hours, now that it had seemed +to be within my grasp, was damping. However--! The Sergeant-Major had +told me that I was to go on duty as orderly in Ward W--an officers' +ward--at 2 p.m. prompt. I did not know where Ward W was; I did not know +what a ward-orderly's functions should amount to. And I had no uniform. +I was attired in a light grey lounge suit--appropriate enough to my +normal habit, but quite too flippant, I was certain, for a ward-orderly. +Whatever else a ward-orderly might be, I was sure that he was not the +sort of person to sport a grey lounge suit. + +Still, I must hie me to Ward W. I had got my wish. I was in the army at +last. In the army one does not argue. One obeys. So, having been +directed down an interminable corridor, I presented myself at Ward W. + +On entering--I had knocked, but no response rewarded this courtesy--I +was requested, by a stern-visaged Sister, to state my business. Her +sternness was excusable. The visiting-hour was not yet, and in my +unprofessional guise she had taken me for a visitor. My explanation +dispelled her frowns. She was expecting me. Her present orderly had been +granted three days' leave. He was preparing to depart. I was to act as +his substitute. Before he went he would initiate me into the secrets of +his craft. She called him. "Private Wood!" Private Wood, in his +shirt-sleeves, appeared. I was handed over to him. + +Herein I was fortunate, though I was unaware of it at the time. Private +Wood, who was not too proud to wash dishes (which was what he had at +that moment been doing), is a distinguished sculptor and a man of keen +imagination. At a subsequent period that imagination was to bring forth +the masks-for-facial-disfigurements scheme which gained him his +commission and which has attracted world-wide notice from experts. +Meanwhile his imagination enabled him to understand the exact extent of +a novice's ignorance, the precise details which I did not know and must +know, the essential apparatus I had to be shown the knack of, before he +fled to catch his train. + +He devoted just five minutes, no more, to teaching me how to be a +ward-orderly. Four of those minutes were lavished on the sink-room--a +small apartment that enshrines cleaning appliances, the taps of which, +if you turn them on without precautions, treat you to an involuntary +shower bath. The sink-room contains a selection of utensils wherewith +every orderly becomes only too familiar: their correct employment, a +theme of many of the mildly Rabelaisian jests which are current in every +hospital, is a mystery--until some kind mentor, like Private Wood, lifts +the veil. In four minutes he had told me all about the sink-room, and +all about all the gear in the sink-room and all about a variety of +rituals which need not here be dwelt on. (The sink-room is an excellent +place in which to receive a private lecture.) The fifth minute was spent +in introducing me, in another room, the ward kitchen, to Mrs. +Mappin--the scrub-lady. + +A scrub-lady is attached to each ward; and most wards, it should in +justice be added, are attached to their scrub-ladies. Certainly I was to +find that Ward W was attached to Mrs. Mappin. Mrs. Mappin was washing +up. Private Wood had been helping her. The completion of his task he +delegated to me. "Mrs. Mappin, this is our new orderly. He'll help you +finish the lunch-dishes." Private Wood then slid into his tunic, +snatched his cap from a nail in the wall, and vanished. + +Mrs. Mappin surveyed me. "Ah!" she sighed--she was given to sighing. +"He's a good 'un, is Private Wood." The inference was plain. There was +little hope of my becoming such a good 'un. In any case, my natty grey +tweeds were against me. One could never make an orderliesque impression +in those tweeds. "Better take your jacket off," sighed Mrs. Mappin. I +did so, chose a dishcloth, and started to dry a pyramid of wet plates. +For a space Mrs. Mappin meditated, her hands in soapy water. Then she +withdrew them. "I think," she sighed, "you an' me could do with a cup of +tea." + +And presently I was having tea with Mrs. Mappin. + +I was afterwards to learn that this practice of calling a halt in her +labours for a cup of tea was a highly incorrect one on Mrs. Mappin's +part, and that my share in the transaction was to the last degree +reprehensible. But I was also to learn that faithful, selfless, honest, +and diligent scrub-ladies are none too common; and the Sister who +discovers that she has been allotted such a jewel as Mrs. Mappin is +seldom foolish enough to exact from her a strict obedience to the letter +of the law in discipline. Mrs. Mappin, in her non-tea-bibbing +interludes, toiled like a galley-slave, was rigidly punctual, and never +complained. Her sighs were no index of her character. They were not a +symptom of ennui (though possibly--if the suggestion be not rude--of +indigestion caused by tannin poisoning). She was the best-tempered of +creatures. It is a fact that if I had been so disposed I need never have +given Mrs. Mappin any assistance, though it was within my province to do +so. She would, without a murmur, shoulder other people's jobs as well as +her own. Having finished with bearing children (one was at the Front--it +was Mrs. Mappin who, on being asked the whereabouts of her soldier son, +said, "'E's in France; I don't rightly know w'ere the place is, but it's +_called_ 'Dugout'"), she had settled down, for the remainder of her +sojourn on this plane, to a prospect of work, continuous work. A little +more or a little less made no difference to her. She had nothing else to +do, but work; nothing else to be interested in, except work--and her +children's progress, and her cups of tea. Her ample figure concealed a +warm heart. Behind her wrinkled old face there was a brain with a +limited outfit of ideas--and the chief of those ideas was _work_. + +Our cup of tea was refreshing, but it would be incorrect to convey the +notion that I was allowed to linger over such a luxury. There are few +intervals for leisure in the duty-hours of an orderly in an officers' +ward. Had the Sister and her nurses not been occupied elsewhere, I doubt +whether I should have been free to drink that cup of tea at all--a +circumstance of which perhaps Mrs. Mappin was more aware than I. At any +rate the call of "Orderly!" from a patient summoned me from the kitchen +and into the ward long before I had finished drying Mrs. Mappin's +dishes. + +The patient desired some small service performed for him. I performed +it--remembering to address him as "Sir." Various other patients, +observing my presence, took the opportunity to hail me. I found myself +saying "Yes, Sir!" "In a moment, Sir!" and dropping--with a promptitude +on which I rather flattered myself--into the manner of a cross between a +valet and a waiter, with a subtle dash of chambermaid. Soon I was also a +luggage-porter, staggering to a taxi with the ponderous impedimenta of a +juvenile second lieutenant who was bidding the hospital farewell, and +whose trunks contained--at a guess--geological specimens and battlefield +souvenirs in the shape of "dud" German shells. This young gentleman +fumbled with a gratuity, then thought better of it--and was gracious +enough to return my grin. "Bit awkward, tipping, in these days," he +apologised cheerily, depositing himself in his taxi behind ramparts of +holdalls. "Thank you, Sir," seemed the suitable adieu, and having +proffered it I scampered into the ward again. Anon Sister sent me with a +message to the dispensary. Where the dispensary was I knew not. But I +found out, and brought back what she required. Then to the post office. +Another exploration down that terrific corridor. Post office located at +last and duly noted. Then to the linen store to draw attention to an +error in the morning's supply of towels. Linen store eventually +unearthed--likewise the information that its staff disclaimed all +responsibility for mistakes--likewise the first inkling of a profound +maxim, that when a mistake has been made, in hospital, it is always the +orderly, and no one else, who has made it. + +Engaged on these errands, and a host of intervening lesser exploits in +the ward, I had to cultivate an unwonted fleetness of foot. I flew. So +did the time. Almost immediately, as it seemed to me, I was bidden to +serve afternoon tea to our patients. The distribution of bed-tables, of +cups, of bread-and-butter (most of which, also, I cut); the "A little +more tea, Sir?" or, "A pot of jam in your locker, Sir, behind the pair +of trousers?... Yes, here it is, Sir"; the laborious feeding of a +patient who could not move his arms;--all these occupied me for a +breathless hour. Then an involved struggle with a patient who had to be +lifted from a bath-chair into bed. (I had never lifted a human being +before.) Then a second bout of washing-up with Mrs. Mappin. Then a +nominal half-an-hour's respite for my own tea--actually ten minutes, for +I was behindhand. Then, all too soon, more waitering at the ceremony of +Dinner: this time with the complication that some of my patients were +allowed wine, beer, or spirits, and some were not. "Burgundy, Sir?" +"Whiskey-and-soda, Sir?" I ran round the table of the sitting-up +patients, displaying (I was pleased to think) the complete aplomb and +nimbleness of a thoroughbred Swiss _garçon_, pouring out drinks--with +concealed envy--placing and removing plates, handing salt, bread, +serviettes.... After which, back to Mrs. Mappin and her renewed mountain +of once-more-to-be-washed-and-dried crockery. + +It was long after my own supper hour had come and gone that I was able +to say au revoir to the ward. The cleansing of the grease-encrusted +meat-tin was a travail which alone promised to last half the night. +(Mrs. Mappin eventually lent me her assistance, and later I became more +adroit.) And the calls of "Orderly!" from the bed patients were +interruptions I could not ignore. But at last some sort of conclusion +was reached. Mrs. Mappin put on her bonnet. The night orderly, who was +to relieve me, was overdue. Sister, discovering me still in the kitchen, +informed me that I might leave. + +"You ain't 'ad any supper, 'ave you?" said Mrs. Mappin. "You won't get +none now, neither. Should 'ave done a bunk a full hower back, you +should." + +She drew me into the larder, and indicated the debris of our patients' +repast. "A leg of chicken and some rice pudden. Only wasted if _you_ +don't 'ave it." + +"But is it allowed--?" I was, in truth, not only tired but ravenous. + +Sister, entering upon this conspiratorial dialogue, unhesitatingly gave +her approval. + +Cold rice pudding and a left-over leg of chicken, eaten standing, at a +shelf in a larder, can taste very good indeed, even to the wearer of a +spick-and-span grey lounge suit. I shall know in future what it means +when my restaurant waiter emerges from behind the screened service-door +furtively wiping his mouth. I sympathise. I too have wolfed the choice +morsels from the banquet of my betters. + + + + +II + +LIFE IN THE ORDERLIES' HUTS + + +In May, 1915, when I enlisted, the weather was beautiful. Consequently +the row of tin huts, to which I was introduced as my future address "for +the duration," wore an attractive appearance. The sun shone upon their +metallic sides and roofs. The shimmering foliage of tall trees, and a +fine field of grass, which made a background to the huts, were fresh and +green and restful to the eye. Even the foreground of hard-trodden +earth--the barrack square--was dry and clean, betraying no hint of its +quagmire propensities under rain. Later on, when winter came, the +cluster of huts could look dismal, especially before dawn on a wet +morning, when the bugle sounding parade had dragged us from warm beds; +or in an afternoon thaw after snow, when the corrugated eaves wept +torrents in the twilight, and one's feet (despite the excellence of army +boots) were chilled by their wadings through slush. Meanwhile, however, +the new recruit had nothing to complain of in the aspect of the housing +accommodation which was offered him. Merely for amusement's sake he had +often "roughed it" in quarters far less comfortable than these bare but +well-built huts--which even proved, on investigation, to contain beds: +an unexpected luxury. + +"I'll put you in Hut 6," said the Sergeant-Major. "There's one empty +bed. It's the hut at the end of the line." + +Thereafter Hut 6 was my home--and I hope I may never have a less +pleasant one or less good company for room-mates. In these latter I was +perhaps peculiarly fortunate. But that is by the way. It suffices that +twenty men, not one of whom I had ever seen before, welcomed a total +stranger, and both at that moment and in the long months which were to +elapse before various rearrangements began to scatter us, proved the +warmest of friends. + +Twenty-one of us shared our downsittings and our uprisings in Hut 6. +There might have been an even number, twenty-two, but one bed's place +was monopolised by a stove (which in winter consumed coke, and in summer +was the repository of old newspapers and orange-peel). The hut, +accordingly, presented a vista of twenty-one beds, eleven along one wall +and ten along the other, the stove and its pipe being the sole +interruption of the symmetrical perspective. Above the beds ran a +continuous shelf, bearing the hut-inhabitants' equipment, or at least +that portion of it--great-coat, water-bottle, mess-tin, etc.--not +continually in use. Below each bed its owner's box and his boots were +disposed with rigid precision at an exact distance from the box and +boots beneath the adjacent bed. In the ceiling hung two electric lights. +These, with the stove, beds, shelves, boxes and boots, constituted the +entire furniture of the hut--unless you count an alarm-clock, bought by +public subscription, and notable for a trick of tinkling faintly, as +though wanting to strike but failing, in the watches of the night, hours +before its appointed minute had arrived. The hut contained no other +furniture whatever, and in those days did not seem to us to require any. +In the autumn, when the daylight shortened and we could no longer hold +our parliaments on a bench outside, a couple of deck-chairs were +mysteriously imported; and, as the authorities remained unshocked, a +small table also appeared and was squeezed into a gap beside the stove. +Some sybarite even goaded us into getting up a fund for a strip of +linoleum to be laid in the aisle between the beds. This was done--I do +not know why, for personally I have no objection to bare boards. I +suppose linoleum is easier to keep clean than wood; and that aisle, +tramped on incessantly by hobnail boots which in damp weather were, as +to their soles and heels, mere bulbous trophies of the alluvial deposits +of the neighbourhood, was sometimes far from speckless. But to me the +strip of linoleum made our hut look remotely like a real room in a real +house: it was a touch of the conventional which I never cared for, and I +only subscribed to it when I had voted against it and been overborne. An +extraordinary proposition, that we should inaugurate a plant in a pot +on the stove's lid in summer, was, I am glad to say, negatived. It would +have been the thin end of the wedge ... we might have arrived at +Japanese fans and photograph-frames on the walls. + +Not that our Company Officer would have tolerated any nonsense of that +kind. Punctually at eight-thirty, after the second parade of the day, he +marched through each hut, inspecting it and calling the attention of the +Sergeant-Major to any detail which offended his sense of fitness. On wet +mornings, instead of parading outside, each man stood to his cot, and +thus the comments of the Company Officer, as he went down the aisle, +were audible to all. Stiffly drawn up to attention, we wondered +anxiously whether he would notice anything wrong with our buttons, boots +or belts, or whether he would "spot" the books and jam jars hidden +behind our overcoats on the shelves. Nothing so decadent and civilian as +a book--and certainly nothing so unsightly as a jam jar--must be visible +on your barrack-room shelf. It is sacred to equipment, and particularly +to the folded great-coat. + +"The Art of Folding" might have been the title of the first lesson of +the many so good-naturedly imparted to me by my new comrades. There was, +I learnt, a right way and a wrong way to fold all things foldable. The +great-coat, for instance, must at the finish of its foldings, when it is +placed upon the exactly middle spot above your bed's end, present to the +eye of the beholder a kind of flat-topped pyramid whose waist-line (if a +pyramid can be said to own a waist) is marked by the belt with the three +polished buttons peeping through. The belt must bulge neither to the +right nor to the left; the pyramidal edifice of great-coat must not +loll--it must sit up prim and firm. And unless all your foldings of the +great-coat, from first to last, have, been deftly precise, no pyramid +will reward you, but a flabby trapezium: the belt will sag, its buttons +won't come centrally, and indeed the whole edifice of unwieldy cloth +will topple off its perch on the narrow shelf--which was designed to +refuse all lodgment for the property of persons who had unsound ideas +on the subject of compact storage. + +The second series of folderies to which the novice was initiated +concerned themselves with his bedding. This consisted of a mattress, +three blankets and a pillow. It is an outfit at which no one need turn +up his nose. I never spent a bad night in army blankets, though when out +on leave I am sometimes a victim of insomnia between clean cold sheets. +But the moment the Réveillé uplifted you from your couch, that couch had +to be made ship-shape according to rule. No finicky "airing"! The +mattress must be rolled up, with the pillow as its core, and placed at +the end of the bed. On top of it a blanket, folded longwise and with the +ends hanging down, was laid neatly; on top of _that_ you put the other +two blankets, folded quite otherwise; then you brought the first +blanket's ends over, and reversed the resultant bundle and pressed it +down into a thin stratified parallelogram with oval ends. The strata of +the said parallelogram, viewed from the aisle, must show no blanket +_edges_, only curves of the blankets' folds: the edges (if visible at +all) must face inwards, not outwards. Correct folding, to be sure, gave +no visible edges, viewed from either side; and, once you caught the +knack, correct folding was just as easy as incorrect--though there were +temperaments which did not find it so and which rebelled against these +niceties. + +I was afterwards to learn that this mania for matching (if mania be +indeed a legitimate word for a custom based on common-sense principles +and seldom carried to the extremes which the recruit has been led to +fear) obtains not only in the army but also in the nursing profession. +Not long after I became a ward orderly I got a wigging from my "Sister" +because I had not noticed that every pillow-case of a ward's beds must +face towards the same point of the compass: the pillows on the vista of +beds must be placed in such a manner that the pillow-case mouths are, +all of them, turned away from anyone entering the ward's door. Similarly +the overlap of the counterpanes must all be of exactly the same depth +and caught up at exactly the same angle, the resulting series of pairs +of triangles all ending at exactly the same spot in each bedstead. These +trifles reveal at a glance the professional touch in a ward, and are, I +understand, not by any means the insignia of a military as distinct from +a civilian hospital. They may or may not contribute to the comfort of +the patient, but they betoken the captaincy of one whose methodicalness +will in other and less visible respects most emphatically benefit him. + +Our hut life was something more than a mere folding-up of bedding on +bedsteads and great-coats on shelves. After midday dinner it was +allowable to unroll the mattress, make the bed, and rest thereon--which +most of us by that time (having been on the run since 6 o'clock parade) +were very ready to do. There was half an hour to spare before 2 o'clock +parade, and a precious half-hour it was. Snores rose from some of the +beds where students of the war had collapsed beneath the newspapers +which they had meant to read. Desultory conversation enlivened those +corners where the denizens of the hut were energetic enough to polish +their boots or sew on buttons. The one or two men who happened to be +"going out on pass"--we were allowed one afternoon per week--were +putting on their puttees and brushing-up the metal buttons of their +walking-out tunics (otherwise known as their Square Push Suits). The +buttons of their working tunics had of course been burnished before +parade. The correct employment of button-sticks and of the magic cleaner +called Soldier's Friend; the polishing of one's out-of-use boots and +their placing, on the floor, with tied laces, and with their toes in +line with the bed's legs; the substitution of lost braces' buttons by +"bulldogs"; the furbishing of one's belt; the propping-up of the front +of one's cap with wads of paper in the interior of the crown; the +devices whereby non-spiral puttees can be coaxed into a resemblance of +spiral ones and caused to ascend in corkscrews above trousers which +refuse to tuck unlumpily into one's socks--these, and a host of other +matters, always kept a proportion of the hut-dwellers awake and busy and +loquacious even in the somnolent post-prandial half-hour before 2 +o'clock. + +But it was at night, at bedtime, that the hut became generally sociable. +Lights-Out sounded at 10.15; and at 10.10 we were all scrambling into +our pyjamas. In winter our disrobing was hasty; in summer it was an +affair of leisure, and deshabille roamings to and fro in the aisle, and +gossip. When the bugle blew and the electric lights suddenly ceased to +glow, leaving the hut in a darkness broken only by the dim shapes of the +windows and the red of cigarette-ends, many of us still had to complete +our undressing. We became adepts at doing this in the dark and so +disposing of the articles of our attire that they could be instantly +retrieved in the morning. Once between the blankets, conversation at +first waxed rather than waned. The Night Wardmaster, whose duty it was +to make the round of the orderlies' huts, disapproved of conversation +after Lights-Out, and was apt to say so, loudly and menacingly, when he +surprised us by popping his head in at the door. But--well--the Night +Wardmaster always departed in the long run.... And then uprose, between +bed and bed, those unconclusive debates in which the masculine soul +delighteth: Theology; Woman; Victuals; Politics; Art; the Press; Sport; +Marriage; Money--and sometimes even The War; likewise the purely local +topics of Sisters and their Absurdities; Our Officers; The Other Huts; +What the Sergeant-Major Said; Why V.A.D.'s can't replace Male Orderlies; +What this Morning's Operations Looked Like; Whether an Officers' Ward or +a Men's Ward is the nicer; Who Deserves Stripes; C.O.'s Parade and its +Terrors; Advantages of Volunteering for Night Duty; The Cushy Job of +being in charge of a Sham Lunacy Case; Other Cushy Jobs less cushy than +They Sounded; and so forth; until at last protests began to be voiced by +the wearier folk who wanted silence. + +Silence it was, except for the thunder of occasional passing trains in +the near-by railway cutting. These had little power to disturb. Tucked +in the brown army blankets, which at first sight look so hard and so +prickly, we slumbered, the twenty-one of us, as one man; until, with a +cruel jolt, at 5.15 that wretched alarm-clock crashed forth its summons +for the fastidious few who liked to rise in ample time to bath and shave +before early parade. Sometimes I was of that virtuous band, and +sometimes I wasn't; but, either way, I hated the alarm-clock at +5.15,--though not so virulently as did those members of the hut who +never by any chance dreamt of rising until five to six. These gentry had +reduced the ritual of dressing, and of rolling up their bedding, to a +speed at which it might almost be compared to expert juggling: the +quickness of the hand deceived the eye. At five minutes to six you would +see the juggler asleep on his pillow, in blissful innocence; at six he +would be on parade, as correctly attired as you were yourself, and +having left behind him, in the hut, a bed as neatly folded as yours. The +world is sprinkled with people who can do this kind of thing--and our +hut was blessed with its due leaven of them. But I would not assert that +they _never_ had to put some finishing touches, either to their dress +or to their hut equipment foldings, before the Company Officer's tour of +inspection at 8.30. It sufficed that they would pass muster at 6 +o'clock, when appearances are less minutely important. And the man who +never rises till 5.55 detests an alarm-clock that whirrs at 5.15. The +hour at which the alarm-clock should be set to detonate was one of our +few acrimonious subjects of argument: I have even known it upset a +discussion on Woman. But the early risers had their way, and the clock +continued to be set for half an hour in front of Réveillé. + +The harsh vibration of the alarm at one end of the day, and the expiry +of the Lights-Out talks at the other--these events marked the chief +time-divisions in our hut life. While we were absent at work, our +interests were many and scattered; but the hut was a nucleus for +communal bonds of union which evoked no little loyalty and affection +from us all. On the May morning when I first beheld that corrugated-iron +abode I thought it looked inviting enough; but I did not guess how fond +I was to grow of its barn-like interior and of the sportive crew who +shared its mathematically-allotted floor-space. "Next war," one optimist +suggested during a typical Lights-Out séance, "let's all enlist together +again." There were protests against the implied prophecy, but none +against the proposition as such. That is the spirit of hut comradeship +... a spirit which no alarm-clock controversies can do aught to impair; +for though 5.15 a.m. is an hour to test the temper of a troop of +twenty-one saints, 10.15 p.m. will bring geniality and garrulousness to +twenty-one sinners. + + + + +III + +WASHING-UP + + +The following substances (to which I had previously been almost a +stranger) absorbed much of my interest during my first months as a +hospital orderly: + +Coagulated pudding, mutton fat and beef fat, cold gravy, treacle, +congealed cocoa, suet duff, skins of once hot milk: + +Plates, cups, frying-pans and other utensils smeared with the above: + +Knives, forks and spoons, ditto. + +I am fated to go through life, in the future, not merely with an exalted +opinion of scullery-maids--this I should not regret--but also with an +only too clear picture, when at the dinner table, of the adventures of +each dish of broken meats on its exit from view. I have been behind the +scenes at the business of eating, or rather, at the dreadful repairs +which must be instituted when the business of eating is concluded in +order that the business of eating may recommence. + +There were days when the ward-kitchen was to me a battlefield and I +seemed to be fighting on the losing side. This was when our scrub-lady +was ill or had "got the sack" and it fell to me, the orderly, to do the +washing-up single-handed. Those patients who were well enough to be on +their feet were supposed to help. (I speak of a men's ward, of course, +not an officers'.) They did help, and that right willingly. Sometimes I +was blessed by the presence of a patient with a passion for cleaning +things. When there were no dishes to clean he would clean taps. When the +taps shone like gold he would clean the hooks on the dresser. When all +our kitchen gear was clean he would invade, with a kind of fury, the +sink-room and clean the apparatus there. When this was done he would +clean the ward's windows and door handles. Between-times he would clean +his boots and shave patients in bed. The new army is thickly sown with +men like that. They are the salt of the earth. I would place them at the +summit of the commonwealth's salary list, the bank clerk second, and the +business man, the artist and the politician at the bottom. At all events +these were my sentiments when a patient of this type, convalescing, +began to be able to help me with my kitchen chores. But it occasionally +chanced that every single patient in the ward was confined to bed. It +was then that I made my most intimate acquaintance with the catalogue of +horrors I have cited. + +You behold me, with my shirt-sleeves rolled up, faced by a heap of +twenty plates, twenty forks, twenty knives and twenty spoons, all +urgently requiring washing. Were these my whole task I should not +shrink. They would be nicely polished-off long ere one-fifteen +arrived--the time when I should (but probably shall not be able to) +leave for my own meal in the orderlies' mess. But there are two far more +serious opponents waiting to be subdued--the dinner-tin and the +pudding-basin. This pair are hateful beyond words. Their memory will +for ever haunt me, a spectral disillusionment to spoil the relish of +every repast I may consume in the years that are ahead. + +The dinner-tin was a rectangular box some three feet long, twenty inches +wide and six inches deep. It was made of solid metal, was fitted with a +false bottom to contain hot water, and was divided internally into three +compartments to hold meat, vegetables and duff. These viands were loaded +into the tin at the hospital's central kitchen. I had naught to do with +the cookery--which I may mention always seemed to me to be excellent. My +sole concern was with the helping-out of the food to the patients and +the restoration of the dinner-tin to its shelf in the central kitchen. +For unless I restored that tin in a faultless state of cleanliness, the +sergeant in charge of the central kitchen would require my blood. The +tin's number would betray me. The sergeant needed not to know my name: +all he had to do, on discovering the questionable tin, was to glance at +its number and then send for the orderly of the ward with a +corresponding number. + +He was a sergeant whose aspect could be very daunting. I never had to +come before him on the subject of a dirty dinner-tin. But he and I had +some small passages concerning "specials" (separate diets ordered for +patients requiring delicacies). Sometimes the necessary forms for the +specials had been incorrectly made out by a Sister with no head for army +accuracy in minor clerical details. Thereafter it was my unlucky place +to see the sergeant, and put the matter straight with him. I have +survived those encounters. I have survived them with an enhanced respect +for the sergeant and the organisation of his large and by no means +simple department. There were moments, nevertheless, when I approached +his presence with a sinking heart. For if I failed to "get round" him in +the matter of coaxing another special for a patient, there was Sister to +placate on my return to the ward; and it was quite impossible to +persuade Sister that she could have made a mistake with her diet sheets, +or, if she had, that it was of any consequence. + +The dinner-tin was somewhat larger than the sink in which I was supposed +to wash it. It was also very heavy. When full of food, and its false +bottom charged with hot water, I could only just lift it, and my +progress down the ward, carrying it from the trolley in the corridor to +the ward-kitchen, was a perilous and perspiring shuffle. As soon as all +the patients had been served I placed any left-over slices of meat in +the larder: these would be eaten at tea. Then I drained out the hot +water from the false bottom. Then (but only after experience had given +me wisdom) I ran hot water from the geyser tap into the now empty meat, +vegetable and duff compartments, and gave them a hurried swill: this to +rid them of the pestilent dregs of fatty material which would otherwise +have dried and glued themselves to the floor of the tin. The latter had +now to be put on one side, for I must be back in the ward attending to +my diners. Only when they had finished their meal, and their bed-tables +had been removed, folded up and placed neatly behind each bed, could I +tackle the tin in earnest. + +I abhor dabbling in grease; but life is full of abhorrent dilemmas which +must be endured; and the interior of that dinner-tin somehow got itself +cleaned, every day, in the long run. During the early part of any given +week I was almost happy over the job. For Monday was "Dry Store" day. On +Monday, and on Monday only--and you were helpless for the remainder of +the week if you forgot the rule--you could obtain, on presentation of a +chit, blacklead for the stoves, metal-polish for the brass, rags for +cleaning the floor, floor-polish, one box of matches, bath-brick, soft +soap, and--soda. It is an extraordinary chemical, soda. Before I became +a ward orderly I had no idea of the remarkable properties of soda. A +handful of soda in boiling water, and behold the grease dissolve meekly +from the nastiest dinner-tin! It was miraculous. When a pitying +scrub-lady first showed me the trick I thought that all my troubles were +at an end. Soda made the ward-kitchen seem like heaven. Alas, the +supply of soda considered sufficient by the Dry Store authorities never +lasted beyond Wednesday. On Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday the +dinner-tin had to be cleaned out not by alkaline agency, but by sheer +slogging hard labour. And when at last I stood it on edge to dry, and +thought to go off duty with a clear conscience, I generally found that I +had overlooked the waiting pudding-basin. + +On the whole I am inclined to pronounce the pudding-basin a more +obdurate utensil than even the dinner-tin. The pudding-basin, however, +only appeared every second morning. On duff days (duff being served in +the same tin as the meat and vegetables, though in a separate +compartment) we had no pudding. By pudding I mean milk pudding--rice or +sago or tapioca. Now a milk pudding, such as those my patients received, +though perhaps it was looked askance at in the nursery, is food which, +as an adult, I am far from despising. Rice pudding I have come with +maturer years to regard as a delicacy. Sago and tapioca I still eat +rather with amiable resignation than from choice. But any milk pudding, +as I now know, has a most vicious habit of cleaving to the dish in which +it was cooked. Rice is the least evil offender. The others are +absolutely wicked. To clean oleaginous scum from a dinner-tin is not +easy, but it is a mere bagatelle compared with cleaning the scorched +high-tide-mark of tapioca or sago from the shores of a large metal +pudding-basin. I have tried scraping with a knife blade, I have tried +every reasonable form of friction, and I can simply state as a fact from +my own personal experience (perhaps I am unfortunate) that those metal +pudding-basins of ours would frequently yield to nothing less powerful +than sandpaper. + +I need scarcely say that sandpaper was not supplied by the deities of +the Dry Store. Sandpaper did not come within their purview. It had no +recognised use in hospital. Therefore it did not exist. But, observing +that a succession of metal pudding-basins would be an insupportable +prospect without sandpaper, I laid in a stock of sandpaper, paying for +the same out of my own private purse. It was a cheap investment. Never +have earnings of mine been better spent. Moreover, having once hit on +the notion of giving myself a lift illegitimately, so to speak, I added +to the smuggling-in of sandpaper a secret purchase of soda. Except that +our scrub-ladies, each and all, discovering that the Dry Store's +allowance of this priceless chemical had at last apparently been +generous, caused it to fly at a disconcerting pace, and as a result +sometimes left me short of it, my career as a washer-up afterwards +became more comfortable. + +I shall never like washing-up. In the communal households of the future +I shall heave coal, sift cinders, dig potatoes, dust furniture or scour +floors--any task will be mine which, though it makes me dirty, does not +make me greasily dirty. But if I must wash-up, if I must study the +idiosyncrasies of cold fat, treacly plates, frying-pans which have +sizzled dripping-toast on the gas-ring, frozen gravy, and pudding-basins +with burnt milk-skins filmed to their sides, I shall be comparatively +undismayed. For sandpaper is not yet (like the news posters) abolished; +and soda--although I hear its price has risen several hundred per +cent.--is still cheaper than, say, diamonds. + + + + +IV + +A "HUT" HOSPITAL + + +People have curious ideas of the kind of building which would make a +good war hospital. "The So-and-So Club in Pall Mall," I have been told, +"should have been commandeered long ago. Ideal for hospital purposes. Of +course some of the M.P. members brought influence to bear, and the War +Office was choked off...." And so forth. + +It would surprise me to hear of anything that the War Office was held +back from doing if it wanted to do it. Perhaps the least likely +obstructionist to be successful in this project would be a +club-frequenting M.P. The War Office has taken exactly and precisely +what it chose--even when it would have been better to choose otherwise. +In this matter of commandeering buildings for hospitals it may or may +not have acted with wisdom; but at least it has been safe in avoiding +the advice of the individual who jumps to the conclusion that just any +pleasingly-situated edifice will do, provided beds and nurses are +shovelled into it in sufficient quantities. + +The indignant patriot who was convinced that chicane alone saved the +So-and-So Club from being dedicated to the service of the wounded was +quite unable to tell me whether the lifts--assuming that lifts +existed--were roomy enough to accommodate stretchers; whether, if so, no +interval of stairs prevented trollies from being wheeled to every ward; +whether the arrangement of the building would allow of the network of +plumbing necessitated by the introduction of numerous bathrooms and +lavatories (for each ward must possess both); whether the kitchens were +so located that they could supply food to top-floor patients without +waste of carrying labour on the part of the orderlies' staff. These +problems, the mere fringe of the subject, had never occurred to our +patriot. His idea of a hospital was a place where soldiers lie in bed +and get well. (What queer notions visitors absorb of the _easiness_ of +hospital life!) He had not glimpsed the organisation which made the cure +possible. The man in bed, a Sister hovering in the background with, +apparently, nothing to do but look pleasant--these constituted, for him, +the final phenomena of a war hospital. These phenomena, instead of being +housed in a wood-and-corrugated-iron shed, might have been staged +picturesquely in one of the luxurious salons of the So-and-So Club in +Pall Mall. It was a shame that they weren't. He would write to the +papers about it. Somebody must be blamed, somebody must be made to +hustle. And meanwhile the Sisters and doctors who _were_ installed in +gorgeous mansions for their work were openly envying the fortunate ones +who had been given those bare but efficient and compactly-planned sheds. + +Some years ago a number of public buildings were earmarked for hospital +use in case of war. It may surprise the indignant patriots to learn that +any preparations whatever were made prior to the outbreak in 1914. +Nevertheless all kinds of preparations actually were made. Mistakes and +miscalculations may have marred those preparations: the fact remains +that, as far as the Territorial Medical Service was concerned, the +authorities had merely to press a button and hospitals came into +existence. Thus a number of institutions--mostly schools--found +themselves ejected from their own roof-trees: found, in short, (what +many other folk were to learn later) that the State is omnipotent in +war-time and that sectional interests fade into insignificance compared +with the interests of the safety of the commonwealth. Some conception of +the promptness with which this paper scheme of Sir Alfred Keogh's +materialised at the outbreak of war may be gathered from the simple +statement that the building of which I myself write was an Orphans' Home +on August 4th, 1914. At 6 a.m. on August 5th it was a military hospital. + +I do not say that it was a military hospital in working order. But if, +by a miracle, wounded _had_ turned up then, there was at least a staff +of medical officers and orderlies on the premises to receive them. In +point of fact it was some weeks before the first patients arrived. Those +weeks, however, were not idle ones. The layman who considers that any +large building can be turned instantaneously into a hospital would have +had an eye-opener if he had witnessed the work done here. The mere +removing of 95 per cent. of the institution's furniture was a colossal +task; added thereto was the introduction of hundreds of beds, hundreds +of mattresses, hundreds of sets of bedclothes, hundreds of suits of +pyjamas, hundreds of--But why prolong a brain-racking list? Then there +was the pulling-down and fixing-up of partitions, the removal of every +single window for replacement by Hopper sashes, the fitting-in of +bathrooms, lavatories, ward-kitchens, sink-rooms, dispensary, cookhouse, +operating-theatre, pathological laboratory, linen-store, steward's +store, clothing-store, detention-room, administration offices, X-ray +department ... all these in a building which, spacious and handsome +outwardly, was, as to its interior, a characteristic maze in the +Scottish baronial style of architecture beloved by mid-Victorian +philanthropists. How the evicted orphans will like to return to those +stone-flagged passages and large airy dormitories, after having +experienced the comforts of the banal but snug suburban villas in which +they are at present located, I know not. There is a certain dignity +about the Scottish baronial pile, I admit. The silhouette of its grey +stone façade, rising above delightful lawns, makes a good +impression--from a distance. Postcard views of it sell freely to +visitors. But the best part of our hospital is hidden behind that +turreted façade, and is much too "ugly" and utilitarian for postcard +immortalisation. + +The best part of our hospital--_the_ hospital, to most of us--came into +being when the commandeered Scottish baronial orphans' asylum was found +to be too small. Then were built "the huts." + +The word "hut" suggests something casual, of the camping-out order: a +shed knocked together with tin-tacks, doubtfully weather-proof and +probably scamped by profiteering contractors. Of the huts provided at +certain training centres this may have been true. The finely austere +and efficient ranks of hut-wards which constitute the main part of the +3rd London General Hospital are the very antithesis of that picture. +They may look flimsy. They were certainly put up at a remarkable pace. I +myself witnessed the erection of the final fifty of them. An open field +vanished in less than a month, and "Bungalow Town" (as someone nicknamed +it) appeared. You would have said that such speed meant countless +imperfections of detail. No doubt some tinkerings and modifications were +bound to follow, when the regiment of workmen, carpenters, engineers, +drainage specialists, electricians, had vanished. But, in the long run, +the ideal hospital remained--a hospital with which the So-and-So Club in +Pall Mall, for all its luxuriousness, could never hope to compare. + +There are still a dozen wards--used mostly for medical cases--in the +Scottish baronial building. Its rooms, too, provide the Administration +with offices. Its great Dining Hall is a splendid Receiving Ward for the +sorting-out and clearance of newly-arrived convoys of patients. We +should be poorly situated indeed if we had not our Scottish baronial +main building to be the hub of the hospital's activities, or rather the +handle from which springs the fan of the hospital's great extension--the +huts. Approaching the hospital the visitor sees nothing of those huts. +As he walks up the drive he flatters himself that he has reached his +destination. He discovers his mistake when, at the inquiry bureau in the +entrance, he is informed that the patient whom he has come to interview +is (say) in "C 13." He is advised to go down the passage on his left, +turn to his right, turn to the left again and then again to the +right--after which he had better seek a further re-direction. Launching +himself optimistically on this voyage he learns, long ere he has +attained his goal, that a modern war-hospital can hide a considerable +extent of pedestrianism behind a comparatively short Scottish baronial +frontage. He will be fortunate if five minutes' steady tramping brings +him to the bedside of his friend in C 13. + +Perhaps he will content himself in his footsoreness by noting that, to +reach C 13, he has not had to go up or down any stairs. This is one of +the beauties of the hut system. It consumes a big area, but it is all +on one level--the ground level. The patient on crutches can go anywhere +without fear of tripping, the patient in a wheeled chair can propel +himself anywhere, the orderlies can push wheeled stretchers or +dinner-wagons anywhere. Our visitor for C 13, having escaped from the +back of the Scottish baronial building, emerges into a vista of covered +corridors, wooden-floored, galvanised-iron roofed. It is a heartbreaking +vista to the poor woman who has had no bus-fare and is burdened by a +baby in arms. It is a vista which seems to have no end. Corridor +branches out of corridor--A Corridor, B Corridor, C Corridor, D +Corridor, each with its perspective of doors opening into wards; and +shorter corridors leading to store-rooms and the like. But the patient +or orderly who has dwelt in a hospital where, though distances are +shorter, staircases are involved--or where every trifling +coming-and-going of goods or stretchers necessitates the manipulation of +a lift--blesses those level, smooth corridors, with their facile access +to any ward, to operating theatres, kitchens, stores, X-ray room, +massage department, etc., and their stepless exit into the open air. + +Looked at from outside, a hut-ward is--to the æsthetic eye--a hideous +structure. Knowing what it stands for, the science, the tenderness and +the fundamental civilisation which it represents, we may descry, behind +its stark geometrical outlines, a real nobility and beauty. Entering a +typical hut-ward you behold thirty beds, fifteen on each side of the +room. Between each pair of beds is a locker in which the patient stows +his belongings. (Woe betide him if his locker is not kept neat!) In the +central aisle of the room are the Sister's writing-table, certain other +tables, chairs, and two coke stoves for heating purposes in winter. The +floor is carpetless, and maintained in a meticulous state of high gloss +by means of daily polishings. At a height of a few feet from the floor, +the asbestos-lined walls cease and become windows. There is no gap in +the continuous line of windows all down each side of the ward--a special +type of window which, even when open, declines to allow rain to enter. +In consequence of these windows the ward is not only very well lit, but +also airy and odourless. When all the windows are open (which is the +case throughout the entire summer and generally the case in winter also) +the patient has the advantages of indoor comfort plus an outdoor +atmosphere. At the end of the ward a covered verandah is spacious enough +to take an extra couple of beds for those requiring completely open-air +treatment. + +The ward proper has certain additions: a kitchen with gas-stove and +geyser; a sink-room with geyser and cleansing apparatus of special +pattern; a bathroom with geyser; lavatories; a small room for the +isolation of a patient on the danger-list; a linen-room; and cupboards. +All these are packed neatly under that one rectangular corrugated roof +which looked so ugly and so unpromising from outside. + +Do not pity the wounded soldier because he is quartered in a "hut." The +word sounds unattractive. But if it is the right kind of hut, he is in +the soundest and most sanitary type of temporary hospital that the mind +of man has yet devised. The rain-drops may rattle a shade noisily on the +roof, the asbestos lining may be devoid of ornamentation, but as he +lies in bed and contemplates that unadorned ceiling he is a deal better +off than if he were gazing at the elaborate (and dust-harbouring) +cornices of the So-and-So Club's grandiose smoking-lounge in Pall Mall. + + + + +V + +FROM THE "D" BLOCK WARDS + + +If you walk up the corridor at half-past four on certain afternoons of +the week you will meet a mob of patients trooping from their wards to +the concert-room. Being built of wood and corrugated iron, the corridor +is an echoing cave of noises. It echoes the tramp of feet--and +army-pattern boots were not soled for silence. It echoes the thud-thud +of crutches. It echoes the slurred rumble of wheeled chairs and +stretcher-trollies. But, above all, at half-past four on concert days it +echoes happy talk and chaff and boisterous laughter. + +As often as not, the loudest talk, the cheeriest chaff, the most +spontaneous laughter, emanate from the blue-clad stalwarts who have +mustered from the "D" Block wards. + +"D" Block contains the wards for eye-wound cases. + +Here they come, a string of them, mostly with bandages round their +heads. The leading man owns one good eye--a twinkling eye--an eye of +mischief--an eye (you would guess at once) for the girls. (But the eye's +owner probably calls them the "pushers." Such is our language now.) +Behind him, in single file, and in step with him, march a gang of +patients each with his hand on the shoulder of the man in front. Tramp, +tramp! Their tread is purposely thunderous on the bare boards of the +corridor. They sing as they advance. It is a ragtime chorus whose most +memorable line runs, "You never seem to kiss me in the same place +twice." A jaunty lilt, to be sure, both in tune and in rhythm. Tramp, +tramp! The one-eyed leader swerves round a corner, roaring the refrain. +His followers swerve too. Suddenly the Matron is encountered, emerging +from her room. "Fine afternoon, Matron!" The leader interrupts his chant +to utter this hearty greeting. And, with one voice, "Fine afternoon, +Matron!" exclaim his followers. But they do not turn their heads. Each +with his hand resting on the shoulder of the man in front they go +steadily on, towards the concert-room, with an odd intentness, glancing +neither to one side nor the other. For though, at their leader's cue, +they have hailed the Matron, they have not seen her. They are blind. + +The spectacle of men--particularly young men--who have given their sight +for their country is, to most observers, a moving one. Melancholy are +the reflections of the visitor who meets, for the first time, a +promenading party of our blind patients. It is the plain truth, +nevertheless, that the blind men themselves are far from melancholy. One +of the rowdiest characters we ever had in the hospital was totally +blind. The blind men's wards are notoriously amongst the least sedate. I +offer no explanation. I simply state the fact. I will fortify it by an +anecdote. + +It came to pass that eight complimentary tickets for a Queen's Hall +matinée were received by the Matron, who in due course allotted them to +seven "D" Block patients. An orderly, detailed to take them to the +hall, completed the octette. Corporal Smith, the orderly in question, +recounted his adventures afterwards. "Never again," quoth he, "shall I +jump at a matinée job if there are blind chaps in the party. They're the +deuce." + +You must understand that we hospital orderlies regard the task of +shepherding patients to an entertainment in town as an agreeable form of +holiday. I have had some very pleasant outings of that sort myself. But +not--I am thankful to recall, in the light of Corporal Smith's +narrative--with blind men. One-legged men are often a sufficient care, +in manoeuvring on and off omnibuses. Apparently helpless cripples have +a marvellous gift for losing themselves, entering wrong trains, and +generally escaping--as the hour for return draws nigh--from one's +custody. And the city seems to be full of lunatics ready to supply +alcohol or indigestible refreshments to the most delicate war-hospital +inmates. Even with ordinary patients the orderly's afternoon excursion +is sometimes not unfraught with anxiety. But blind patients, as Corporal +Smith said, are the deuce. + +Out of his party, four were totally blind, two could recognise dimly +the difference between light and darkness, and one had a single good +eye. + +Queen's Hall was reached, by bus, without mishap. After the performance +there was tea at an A.B.C. shop. Here Jock, one of the totally blind +men, a Scotchman--all Scots are "Jocks" in the army--distinguished +himself by facetiæ (audible throughout the whole shop) on the English +pronunciation of the word 'scone,' and intimated his desire to treat the +company to a ballad. This project was suppressed, but "a silly fool in a +top hat threatened to report me for having given my men drink," said +Corporal Smith. "Jock gave _him_ the bird, not 'arf. But I thought it +about time to be going home." + +So the party prepared to go home. + +The bus was voted dull. Somebody suggested the tube. Corporal Smith +consented. + +He had forgotten that at Oxford Circus station the lifts have been +abolished in favour of sliding staircases. Confronted by the escalator, +Corporal Smith halted his party and informed them that they must walk +down by the ordinary stair. The escalator was not safe for blind men. +Unfortunately, Jock had sniffed a lark; the one-eyed man backed him up; +the party--elated perhaps by their tea--would not hear of anything so +humdrum as a descent by the ordinary stair. They were going on the +sliding stair. They insisted. Corporal Smith argued in vain. In vain he +exerted his (purely nominal) authority. His charges mocked him. The +one-eyed man leading, with Jock in his wake, they launched themselves at +the sliding stair. In sheer desperation Corporal Smith brought up the +rear, supporting two of the more timid venturers as best he might. None +of the group except Corporal Smith himself, as it turned out, had ever +travelled on an escalator before. But they had heard a comic song about +a sliding stair, and they wished--Jock especially--to sample this +metropolitan invention. + +By dodging forward to place each blind man's hand upon the banister, +Corporal Smith managed to send off his patients without a stumble. But +as the stair inexorably lowered them into the bowels of the earth he +realised, only too vividly, what might happen at the foot of the +descent. The evening rush of suburb-bound passengers had begun and the +staircase was rather crowded. Nobody seemed to realise that the +khaki-overcoated men who stood so still upon the steps were not the +usual hospital convalescents out on leave and able to look after +themselves. Corporal Smith, delayed by one man who had hesitated at the +top before taking the plunge, beheld his charges below him, hopelessly +dotted, at intervals, amongst the general public. It was impossible for +him to struggle down ahead, to the bottom of the staircase, to guide the +men off as they arrived. This task, he hoped, would be adequately +performed by the one-eyed man. + +It might have been. The one-eyed man was game for anything. But Jock, +arriving in the highest good humour at the bottom of the staircase, was +tilted sideways by the curve, and promptly sat down on the +landing-place. Instead of rising, he proclaimed aloud that this was +funnier even than England's pronunciation of the word 'scone.' +Whereupon various hurrying passengers, including an old lady, tripped +over his prone form. The sensation of being kicked and sat upon appealed +to Jock's sense of humour. The more people avalanched across him the +more comic he thought it. And in a moment there was quite a pile of +wriggling bodies on top of him. For though the public managed on the +whole to leap over, or circumvent, the obstacle presented by Jock's +extremely large body, none of his blind comrades did so. + +"Every single one of them fell flop," said Corporal Smith; "I give you +my word." + +But were they downhearted? No! They regarded this mysterious hurly-burly +of arms and legs as a capital jest. So far from being alarmed or +annoyed, they shouted with glee. The old lady, who had gathered herself +together and was directing a stream of voluble reproof at Corporal Smith +for his "callousness and cruelty to these unhappy blind heroes," retired +discomfited. Jock's comments routed her more effectively than the +Corporal's assurance that the episode was none of his choosing. + +The party at last sorted itself out and was placed upon its feet once +more. It was excessively pleased with its exploit. Hilarity reigned. +Corporal Smith, relieved, made ready to conduct his squad to the +platform. + +Alas, a bright idea occurred to Jock. Why not go up the other sliding +stair and down again? + +Agreed, _nem. con._ At least, Corporal Smith's _con._ was too futile to +be worth counting. + +"I had to go with the blighters," said he. "There was no end of a crowd +by this time. And Jock and some of the others fell over at the top +again. And there was a row with the ticket-collector. And people kept +saying they'd report me. _Me!_ And when I'd got my party down to the +bottom for the second time, and some of the tube officials had come and +said they couldn't allow it and we must buzz off home, I lined the +fellows up to march 'em to the train, and dash me if two weren't +missing. They'd given me the slip." + +The two truants, it may be added, could not be found. Corporal Smith +had to return without them. At a late hour of the evening they appeared, +not an atom repentant, at the hospital, having persuaded someone to put +them into the correct bus. One of them, Jock, explained that, being from +the North, he had desired to seize this opportunity of seeing the sights +of London. Jock, I may remind you, is totally blind. Jock's guide, the +man who had volunteered to show him the sights and who had only once +been in London before, could see very faintly the difference between +light and dark.... Thus this pair of irresponsibles had fared forth into +the dusk of Regent Street. + + * * * * * + +It sounds a very horrible fate to be blinded. But somehow the blind men +themselves seldom seem to be overwhelmed by its horribleness. If you +want to hear the merriest banter in a war hospital, visit the blind +men's wards. The pathos of them lies less in the sadness of the victims +than in the triumphant, wonderful fact that they are _not_ sad. I wish +we others all inhabited the same mysteriously jocund spiritual realm as +Jock and his comrades, who come tramp-tramping to the concert-room down +the corridor from the D wards. + + + + +VI + +WHEN THE WOUNDED ARRIVE + + +The receiving hall of the hospital is its clearing house of patients. It +is a huge room, with a lofty and echoing roof, a little in the style of +a church. Before the war, when the building was a school, this rather +grandiose apartment no doubt witnessed speechifyings and prize +distributions. May the time be not far distant when it will once again +be used for those observances! Meanwhile its vast floor is occupied by +ranks of beds. + +Those beds are generally untenanted. Visitors who, like the lady in the +play, have taken the wrong turning, are apt to find themselves in the +receiving hall, and, gazing at its array of vacant beds, have been known +to conclude that the hospital was empty. (As if any war-hospital, in +these times, could be empty!) But our patients have only a short +acquaintanceship with the receiving-hall beds: these beds are momentary +resting-places on their journey healthwards: they are not meant to lie +in but to lie _on_. The three-score wards for which the receiving hall +is the clearing house are the real destination of the patients; down +long corridors, in wards far cosier because less ornate than this, the +patient will find "his" bed ready for him, the bed which he is not to +lie on but _in_. + +We orderlies meet each convoy at the front door of the hospital. The +walking-cases are the first to arrive--men who are either not ill +enough, or not badly enough wounded, to need to be put on stretchers in +ambulances. They come from the station in motor-cars supplied by that +indefatigable body, the London Ambulance Column. The walking-case +alights from his car, is conducted into the receiving hall, and ten +minutes later is in the bathroom. For the ritual of the bath must on no +account be omitted--although now not so obviously imperative as in the +early period of the war. Few patients reach us who have not first +sojourned, either for a day or two or for weeks, in hospitals in France. +They are therefore merely travel-stained, as you or I might be +travel-stained after coming over from Dublin to Euston. The bath is thus +a pleasure more than a necessity. Whereas there _was_ an era, when our +guests came straight from only too populous trenches.... + +"O.C. Baths," as the bathroom orderly was nicknamed, had to be +circumspect in the performance of his job. + +The few minutes which the walking-case spends in the receiving hall are +occupied (1) in drinking a cup of cocoa, and (2) in "having his +particulars taken." + +Poor soul!--he is weary of giving his "particulars." He has had to give +them half-a-dozen times at least, perhaps more, since he left the front. +At the field dressing-station they wanted his particulars, at the +clearing-station, on the train, at the base hospital, on another train, +on the steamer, on the next train, and now in this English hospital. As +he sits and comforts himself with cocoa, a "V.A.D." hovers at his +elbow, intent on a printed sheet, the details of which she is rapidly +filling-in with a pencil. For this is a card-index war, a colossal +business of files and classifications and ledgers and statistics and +registrations, an undertaking on a scale beside which Harrod's and +Whiteley's and Selfridge's and Wanamaker's and the Magazin du Louvre, +all rolled into one, would be a fleabite of simplicity. Ere the morrow +shall have dawned, our patient's military biography will be recounted, +by various clerks, in I don't know how many different entries. If you +are curious, refer to one of our volumes of the _Admission and Discharge +Book: Field Service Army Book 27a_. Open it at any of its +closely-written pages and see the host of ruled columns which the +orderly in charge of it must inscroll with reference to each of the many +thousands of patients who pass through our hospital per annum. The +columns ask for his Regiment; Squadron, Battery or Company; Number; +Rank; Surname; Christian Name; Age; Length of Service; Completed Months +with Field Force; Diseases (wounds and injuries are expressed by a +number indicating their nature and whereabouts); Date of Admission; Date +of Discharge or Transfer; Number of Days under Treatment; Number of +Ward; Religion; and "Observations"--a space usually occupied by the name +of the hospital ship upon which our friend crossed the Channel, and the +name of the convalescent home to which he went on bidding us adieu. + +Having furnished the preliminary statements which lay the foundation of +this compendious memoir, the walking-case thankfully finishes his cocoa, +picks up the package of "blues" which has been put at his side, and +departs, with his fellows, to the bathroom. Here he is tackled by the +Pack Store orderlies, who take from him, and enter in their books, his +khaki clothes. These he must leave in exchange for the blue slop uniform +which, _pro tem._, is to be his only wear. When he emerges from the +bathroom he is attired in what is now England's most honourable +livery--the royal blue of the war-hospital patient. And (though perhaps +the matter is not mentioned to him in so many words) his own suit is +already ticketed with an identification label and on its way to the +fumigator. This is no reflection on the owner of the suit ... but there +are some things we don't talk about. Mr. Fumigator-Wallah is not the +least busy of the more retiring members of a war-hospital staff. He is +not in the limelight; but you might come to be very sad and sorry if he +took it into his head to neglect his unapplauded part off-stage. + +The walking-cases are still splashing and dressing in the bathroom when +the ambulances with the cot-cases begin to appear. Now is the orderlies' +busy time. Each stretcher must be quickly but gently removed from the +ambulance and carried into the receiving hall. + +Four orderlies haul the stretcher from its shelf in the ambulance; two +orderlies then take its handles and carry it indoors. At the entrance to +the receiving hall they halt. The Medical Officer bends over the +patient, glances at the label which is attached to him, and assigns him +to a ward. (Certain types of cases go to certain groups of wards.) The +attendant sergeant promptly picks a metal ticket from a rack and lays +it on the stretcher. The ticket has, punched on it, the number of the +patient's ward and the number of the patient's bed in that ward. This +ceremony completed, the orderlies proceed, with their burden, up the +aisle between the beds in the receiving hall. + +Arrived at the bed, they lower their stretcher until it is at such a +level that the patient, if he is active enough, can move off it on to +the bed; if he is too weak to help himself he is lifted on to the bed by +orderlies under the direction of the receiving-hall Sister. The +stretcher is promptly removed and restored to its ambulance. If the +patient is in an exceptionally suffering condition he is not placed on +the receiving-hall bed; instead--the Medical Officer having given his +permission--his stretcher is put on a wheeled trolley and he is taken +straight away to his ward, so that he will only undergo one shift of +position between the ambulance and his destination. The majority of +stretcher-cases, however, reach us in a by no means desperate state, +for, as I say, they seldom come to England without having been treated +previously at a base abroad (except during the periods of heavy +fighting). And it is remarkable how often the patient refuses help in +getting off the stretcher on to the bed. He may be a cocoon of bandages, +but he will courageously heave himself overboard, from stretcher to bed, +with a gay _wallop_ which would be deemed rash even in a person in +perfect health. Our receiving hall, at a big intake of wounded, when +every bed bears its poor victim of the war, presents a spectacle which +might give the philosopher food for thought; but I suspect that, if he +regarded its actualities rather than his own preconceptions, what would +impress him more than the sadness would be on the one hand the +kindliness, brisk but not officious, of the staff, and on the other the +spontaneous geniality of the battered occupants of the beds. The +orderlies can spare little time for talk, but the few chats which they +are able to have with patients whom they are helping to change their +clothes, or to whom they are proffering the inevitable cocoa (which is +a cocktail, as it were, prior to the meal which will be served in the +men's own ward), are punctuated by jokes and laughter rather than the +long-visaged "sympathy" which the outsider might--quite wrongly!--have +pictured as appropriate to such an assemblage. + +The stretcher-case, before he is taken to his ward, must also "give his +particulars," must also be interviewed by the Pack Store officials, and +must also have assigned to him his blue uniform (wherewith are a shirt, +a cravat, slippers and socks) in anticipation of the time when he shall +be able to use his feet again and promenade our corridors and grounds. +He receives the customary packet of cigarettes (probably the second, for +he often gets one at the railway station too), and then, on another +stretcher, mounted on a trolley, is wheeled off to his ward. Here, +bestowed in bed at last, we leave him to his blanket-bath, his meal, his +temperature-taking and chart filling-in by the Sister, his visit from +the doctor, and all the rest of it. For the moment we see no more of +him; we must race back to the receiving hall, and, if there are no more +patients to take away, return the trolley to its proper nook, put +straight the blankets and pillows on the beds, sweep the floor, and tidy +up generally, in readiness for the next convoy's advent. + +Presently the huge room, beneath its dim arched ceiling, is silent and +empty once more. The four ranks of beds, without a crease on their brown +blankets, are bare of occupants. The Sister and her probationers have +vanished. The Pack Store orderlies have carried off their loot of dirty +khaki tunics and trousers for the fumigator. The clerical V.A.D.'s have +gone to enter "particulars" in ledgers and card-indices. The cookhouse +people have removed their cocoa urn. The sergeant is inspecting the +metal ward-tickets left in his rack. A glance at them tells him how many +beds, and which beds, are free in the hospital; for the tickets have no +duplicates; any given ticket can only reappear in the rack when the bed +which it connotes is out of use and awaiting a newcomer; the ticket +hangs from a nail in the wall beside the patient's bed just so long as +that bed is tenanted. So the rack of metal tickets might almost take the +place of that important document, of which a freshly-compiled edition is +typed every morning, the Empty Bed List; and the sergeant is meditative +as he sorts into the rack the tickets which have newly been sent in from +the Sisters of wards where there have been departures. "Not much room in +the eye-wound wards," he ponders; or, "A lot of empties in the +medicals." And then ... the tinkle of the telephone.... + +"Another convoy expected at 6.15? Twenty walking-cases and seventeen +cots. Right you are!" + +And at 6.15 the party of orderlies will be back again at the front door, +again the motor-cars will stream up the drive, again the ambulances will +come with their stretchers, and again the receiving hall will awaken +from its interlude of silence to echo with the activities incidental to +a clearing house of those damaged human bundles which are the _raison +d'être_ of our great war-hospital. + + + + +VII + +"T.... A...." + + +War-hospital patients are of many sorts. It is a common mistake of the +arm-chair newspaper devourer to lump all soldiers together as quaint, +bibulous, aitch-dropping innocents, lamblike and gauche in +drawing-rooms, fierce and picturesque on the field, who (to judge by +their published photographs) are continually on the grin and continually +shaking hands either with each other or with equally grinsome French +peasant women at cottage doors or with the local mayor who congratulates +them on the glorious V.C.'s which, of course, they are continually +winning. In a war hospital that harbours many thousands of patients per +annum, we should know, in the long run, something about the +characteristics of Tommy Atkins; and it is with resentment that I hear +him thus classified as a mere type. He is not a type. Discipline and +training have given him some veneer of generalised similarities. Beneath +these, Tommy Atkins is simply the man in the street--any man in any +street; and if you look out of your window in the city and see a throng +of pedestrians upon the pavement you might just as well say that because +they are all civilians they are all alike as that, because all soldiers +wear khaki, they are all alike. + +I have a quarrel with the Press on the score of its persistent fostering +of this notion that "our gallant lads" (as the sentimental scribe calls +them) are a pack of children about whose exploits an unfailing stream of +semi-pathetic, semi-humorous anecdotes must be put forth. Even the old +professional army exhibited no dead level either of blackguards on the +one hand or humble Galahads on the other. But whatever may have been the +case before the war, all the armies of Europe are now alike in this, +that they are composed of civilians who merely happen to have adopted a +certain garb for the performance of a certain job--and, be it remarked, +a temporary job. That garb has not reduced the citizens, who have the +honour to wear it, to a monotonous level either of intelligence or of +conduct: nor even of opinions about the war itself. I have had +fire-eaters in my ward who breathed the sentiments of _John Bull_ and +the _Evening News_, and I have had pacifists (they seemed to have fought +no less bravely) who, week by week, read and approved Mr. Snowden in the +_Labour Leader_; I have had Radicals and Tories, and patients who cared +for neither party, but whose passion was cage-birds or boxing or amateur +photography; I have had patients who were sulky and patients who were +bright, patients who were unlettered and patients who were educated, +patients who could hardly express themselves without the use of an +ensanguined vocabulary and patients who were gently spoken and +fastidious. Each of them was Tommy Atkins--the inanely smirking hero of +the picture-paper and the funny paragraph. Neither his picture nor the +paragraph may be positively a lie, and yet, when the arm-chair dweller +chucklingly draws attention to them, I am tempted to relapse into +irreverence and utter one or other (or perhaps both) of two phrases +which T. Atkins is himself credited with using _ad nauseam_--"Na-poo" +and "I _don't_ think." + +When I assert--as I do unhesitatingly assert--that no one could work in +a war-hospital ward for any length of time without an ever-deepening +respect and fondness for Tommy Atkins, it is the same thing as asserting +that the respect and fondness are evoked by close contact with one's +countrymen: nothing more nor less. A hospital ward is a haphazard +selection of one's fellow-Britons: the most wildly haphazard it is +possible to conceive. And the pessimistic cynic who, after a sojourn in +that changing company for a month or two can still either generalise +about them or (if he does) can still not acknowledge that in the mass +they are amazingly lovable, is beyond hope. The war has taught its +lessons to us all, and none more important than this. For myself I +confess that I never knew before how nice were nine out of ten of the +individuals with whom I sat silent in trains, whom I glanced at in +business offices or behind counters, whom I saw in workshops or in the +field or who were my neighbours in music-halls. They were strangers. In +the years to come I hope they will be strangers no longer. For they and +I have dressed alike and borne the same surname--Atkins. + +Of course, there remain a few generalisations which _can_ safely be +risked about even so nondescript a person as the new Tommy Atkins. As +practically all the Tommy Atkinses are, at this moment, concentrated on +the prosecution of one great job, it is natural that their main +interests should revolve round that job. They all (for instance) want +the job to be finished. They all (within my experience) want it to be +finished well. They nearly all desire earnestly to cease soldiering as +soon as the job _is_ finished well. I never yet met the man (though he +may exist, outside the brains of the scribes aforementioned) who, having +tasted the joys of roughing it, is determined not to return to a humdrum +desk in an office: on the contrary, that office and that humdrum desk +have now become this travelled adventurer's most roseate dream. I have +conversed with patients drawn from nearly every walk in life, and I do +not remember one who definitely spoke of refusing to go back to his +former work--if he could get it. + +One of my patients had been a subterranean lavatory attendant. You would +have thought his ambitions--after visits to Egypt, Malta, the +Dardanelles and France--might have soared to loftier altitudes. He had +survived hair-raising adventures; he had taken part in the making of +history; although wounded he had not been incapacitated for an active +career in the future; and he was neither illiterate nor unintelligent. +Yet he told me, with obvious satisfaction, that his place was being kept +open for him. I was, as it were, invited to rejoice with him over the +destiny which was his. I may add that the singular revelations which he +imparted as to the opportunities for extra earnings in his troglodyte +trade extorted from me a more enthusiastic sympathy than might be +supposed possible. + +That agreeable domestic pet, _homo sapiens_, remains unchanged even when +you dress him up in a uniform and set him fighting. He is always +consistently inconsistent; he is always both reasonable and +unreasonable. You can try to cast him in a mould, but he resumes his +normal shapelessness the moment the mould is removed. Expose him to +frightful ordeals of terror and pain, and he will emerge grumbling about +some petty grievance or carrying on a flirtation with another man's wife +or squabbling about sectarian dogmas or gambling on magazine +competitions or planning new businesses--in fact, behaving precisely as +the natural lord of creation always does behave. No member of our +hospital staff, I imagine, will ever forget the arrival of the first +batch of exchanged British wounded prisoners; It was the most tragic +scene I have ever witnessed. It is a fact, for which I make no apology, +that tears were shed by some of those whose task it was to welcome that +pitiful band of martyrs. We had received convoys of wounded many a time, +but _these_ broken creatures, so pale, so neglected, so thin and so +infinitely happy to be free once more, had a poignant appeal which must +have melted the most rigid official. (And we are neither very official, +here, nor very rigid.) Well, amongst these liberated captives was one +who told a sad tale of starvation at his internment camp. There is +little doubt that it was a true tale, in the main. On that I make no +comment. I simply introduce you to this gentleman, who had been restored +to his native land after ten months of entombment, in order to mention +that on the following morning, when his breakfast was placed before him, +he turned up his nose at it. Loudly complaining of the poorness of the +food, he leant out of bed, picked up a brown-paper parcel which had been +his only luggage, and produced from it some German salted herring, which +he proceeded to eat with grumbling gusto. + +That is not specially Tommy Atkins; it is _homo sapiens_ of the +hearthside, whether in suburban villa or in slum, for ever dissatisfied +(more especially with his victuals) and for ever evoking our affection +all the same. + +No; Tommy Atkins is never twice alike. He is unanimous on few debatable +matters. One of them, as I have said, is the desirability of finishing +the war--in the proper way. (But even here there are differences as to +what constitutes the proper way.) Another is (I trust I shall not shock +the reader) the extreme displeasingness of life at the front. I would +not say that our hospital patients are positively thankful to be +wounded, nor that they do not wish to recover with reasonable rapidity. +But that they are glad to be safe in England once more is undeniable. +The more honour to them that few, if any, flinch from returning to +duty--when they know only too well what that duty consists of. But they +make no bones about their opinion. Not long ago I was the conductor of a +party of convalescents who went to a special matinée of a military +drama. The theatre was entirely filled with wounded soldiers from +hospitals, plus a few nurses and orderlies. It was an inspiring sight. +The drama went well, and its patriotic touches received their due meed +of applause. But when the heroine, in a moving passage, declared that +she had never met a wounded British soldier who was not eager to get +back to the front, there arose, in an instant, a spontaneous shout of +laughter from the whole audience. That was Tommy Atkins unanimous for +once. + +He was unanimous too, I should add, in perceiving immediately that the +actress had been disconcerted by his roar of amusement. The poor girl's +emotional speech had been ruined. She looked blank and stood irresolute. +At once a burst of hand-clapping took the place of the laughter. It was +not ironical, it was friendly and apologetic. "Go ahead!" it said. +"We're sorry. Those lines aren't your fault, anyway. You spoke them very +prettily, and it was a shame to laugh. But the ass of a playwright +hadn't been in the trenches, and if your usual audiences relish that +kind of speech they haven't been there either." + +So much for Tommy Atkins in his unanimous mood--unanimously condemning +cant and at the same time unanimously courteous. Now that I come to +reflect I believe that, in his best moments, these are perhaps the only +two points concerning which Tommy Atkins _is_ unanimous. Whether he +lives up to them or not (and to expect him unflinchingly to live up to +them in season and out of season is about as sensible as to expect him +perpetually to live up to the photographs and anecdotes), we may take +them as his ideal. He dislikes humbug: he tries to be polite. Could one +sketch a sounder scaffolding on which to build all the odd +divergencies--crankinesses and heroisms, stupidities and +engagingnesses--which may go to make the edifice of an average decent +soul's material, mental and spiritual habitation? + + * * * * * + +_Postscript._--An expert--one of England's greatest experts--who has +read the above tells me that I have not done justice to the old +professional army men of Mons and the Aisne. When wounded and in our +hospital they _did_ want to go back to fight. But their sole reason, +given with frankness, was that they considered they were needed: the new +army, in training, was not ready: it would be murder to send the new +army out, unprepared, to such an ordeal. + +This authority, who has interviewed many thousands of convalescents, +further remarked: "The wounded man who has been under shell fire and who +professes to be eager to go back, whether ordered or no, is a liar. On +the other hand, the scrim-shankers who try to get out of going back, +when they should go back, are an amazingly small minority." + + + + +VIII + +LAUNDRY PROBLEMS + + +A number of oddly unmasculine duties fell to the lot of the R.A.M.C. +orderly prior to the time when "V.A.D.'s" were allowed to take his place +(at least to some extent) throughout our English war-hospitals. One of +my first tasks in the morning was the collecting and classification of +my ward's dirty linen. The work cannot be called difficult. It would be +an exaggeration to say that it demands a supreme intellectual effort. +But to the male mind it is, at least, rather novel. The average bachelor +has perhaps been accustomed to scrutinise his collars, handkerchiefs and +underclothes before and after their trips to the laundry. He has seldom, +I think, had intimate trafficking with pillow-cases, sheets, +counterpanes and tablecloths. In the reckoning of these he is apt to +make mistakes and to lapse into a casualness which, in a woman familiar +with household routine, would be improbable. "Sister's" sharpest +reproofs were called forth by errors made in connection with this daily +exchange of clean for dirty linen. + +A form, of course, had to be filled in. (The army provides a form +for everything.) This form presents a catalogue of eighty-one +separate items, from "Blankets" ("Child's," "Infant's"--I do not +know what is the difference between them, and I never had to deal with +either--"G.S."--whatever that may be--and "White") to "Waist-coats, +Strait." It distinguishes between ten kinds of "Cases"--pillow-cases, +paillasse-cases, and the like: for example, there are "barrack" +bolster-cases and "hospital" bolster-cases; and you must not confound +"hospital" mattress-cases with "officers'" mattress-cases. You are +misled if you imagine that the heading "Cases" has exhausted the +possibilities which appeared to be latent in that noun; for, in addition +to the ten unqualified "Cases" there are seven more, defined as "Cases, +slip." Can you wonder that the orderly, presented with a bin-full of +confused and crumpled objects ready for the wash, and told to count them +and enter their numbers in the appointed columns, occasionally made a +wrong guess? Then there were eight sorts of "Cloths"--tablecloth, +tray-cloth, distinctive cloth, and so forth. (To how many lay minds does +"distinctive cloth" convey any meaning?) Counterpanes you would think to +be obvious enough; but that remarkable compilation, the _Check Book for +Hospital Linen_ ("Printed for H.M. Stationery Office...." etc.), +recognises four varieties. It also allows for four varieties of sheets, +four of aprons and four of trousers. Of towels it knows six. + +Each ward has a certain stock of linen in its cupboard. That stock can +only be kept at the proper level by strict barter of a soiled object for +a clean duplicate of the same object. As there are three hundred and +sixty-five days in the year on which this transaction occurs, and sixty +wards' bundles of linen to be dealt with by both the Dirty Linen +Department and the Clean Linen Department on each of those days, it is +clear that exactitude in the filling-in of the form aforementioned +becomes an affair of almost nightmare importance. Bring back from the +Clean Linen Store three dusters instead of the four dusters which you +previously handed in at the Dirty Linen Store, and your cupboard will, +to the end of time, be short of one duster which it should have +possessed. Even if Sister fails to pounce promptly on the evidence of +the loss, the quartermaster's dread stocktaking will ultimately find you +out. Your cupboard declines to correspond with his book-entries. And +there is trouble brewing, in consequence. (But indeed, if the loss of a +single duster were the sole crime revealed on stocktaking day, you would +be fortunate.) + +The orderly, with an obese bundle of washing on his back, plods from the +ward to the Dirty Linen Store at quarter to nine every morning. I say he +"plods" because the bundle is generally too heavy for transportation at +a rapid pace. Twenty sheets are usually but a part of the bundle; and +twenty sheets are alone no light burden. Between his teeth--both his +hands being occupied with the balancing of the bundle--he carries his +chit: that indispensable list. Arrived at the store he dumps the bundle +on the ground, opens it, and pitches its contents piecemeal over a +counter to one of the staff of the store. One by one the objects are +named and counted aloud, as they fly across the counter, the staff +orderly simultaneously checking the list and keeping an eye on what he +is receiving. For we may, by guile, palm off on him one sheet as two. It +can be done, by means of a certain legerdemain which comes with +practice. Or we may have received from the Dry Store, amongst the rags +meant for cleaning purposes, a couple of quite worn-out socks, not a +pair, and long past placing on human feet: these derelicts, with a rapid +motion, can be passed over the counter amongst the good socks, and only +later in the day will the Dirty Linen Store officials detect the +fraud--when it is impossible to locate its perpetrator. The +store-orderly's job is therefore one requiring some astuteness: his +checking of the list has to be achieved at a high speed and in the midst +of a babel; for as many ward-orderlies are present as the length of the +counter will accommodate, and they are all getting rid of their +dirty-linen bundles at the tops of their voices. + +Altercations, I am afraid, were not infrequent in the epoch when the +actors in this drama were of the male sex. (Even now, when the scene is +mainly feminine, I believe differences of opinion continue to arise, but +doubtless the language in which they are conducted is seemlier if no +less deadly.) The store-orderly had a marvellous eye for the difference +between two kinds of shirts which are worn by our patients. One kind has +a pleat in the back, the other kind hasn't; and I confess I occasionally +transposed them, on the form. It was fatal to do so. There was a +separate line for each brand of shirt and there must be a separate +entry. The store-orderly's trained powers of observation could see that +pleat, or the absence of it, even as the shirt slid across his line of +vision in a torrent of other shirts. His hand shot out and grabbed it +back from joining the heap on the floor within the counter. His pencil +poised itself from the ticking-off of the items on the form. "Wrong +again!" he would cry, sometimes in anguish and sometimes in anger. And +there was nothing for it but to apologise. To keep on good terms with +the various orderlies in the various stores was the secret of making +one's life worth living--a secret even profounder than that of keeping +on good terms with Sister: to be sure it was (though she seldom realised +it) the very foundation of the art of keeping on good terms with her. +You could not even begin to please Sister unless, at the end of those +incessant journeyings of yours which she did not see, you had dealings +with store-orderlies who were obliging and who would give you the things +which the taskmistress had sent you to fetch (or would drop a kindly +hint as to where and by what means you could acquire them). The Dirty +Linen Store orderly who declined to accept your plea for forgiveness +when you had been obtuse enough to see a fomentation-wringer in a +teacloth, could devastate the harmony of a whole forenoon. A sweet +reasonableness was undoubtedly the note to strike when such a +contretemps occurred. + +Having got quit of the last item in your bundle, you returned to the +ward to attend to other (and generally less entertaining) duties until +such time as it was proper to repair to the Clean Linen Store. The staff +of the Clean Linen Store, a huge department whose system of book-keeping +is enough to make the brain reel (for here sheets, etc., are dealt with +not in dozens but in thousands), had in the interim received your chit +from their colleagues of the Dirty Linen Store. These latter, rashly or +otherwise, had guaranteed its accuracy by initialing it. Accordingly, in +the Clean Linen Store, a fresh bundle was ready for your acceptance, its +contents consisting of duplicates of the objects now on their way to the +laundry. + +It was unwise, however, to accept this neatly folded and virginal bundle +without investigation. It might contain what the chit demanded; or it +might not. Before you could carry it off you must yourself initial, and +finally bid farewell to, the chit: thereby certifying that you had got +what you claimed. To make sure of this you would be well advised to undo +the bundle, and (as far as was practicable in a jostling crowd of +fellow-orderlies similarly employed) run through the whole of its +contents, computing them with precision: twenty sheets, twelve +pillow-cases, nine bolster-cases--it is only too easy to miss the +difference in the sizes of these--seventeen hand-towels, two +operating-aprons, eleven handkerchiefs, ten pyjama trousers, ten +sleeping-jackets, and so on. When you had ticked-off all these separate +items in the list you scribbled your initials thereon and fled with your +bundle--to find, as often as not, that Sister, sorting the things into +her cupboard, could discover a mistake after all. This meant a humble +return to the Clean Linen Store to beg for the mistake's rectification; +and the sergeant in charge had merely to take your chit from his file, +and show you your own initials on it, to prove that you were in the +wrong. + +It is conceivable that by means of a ward stocktaking and a reference of +the results to the figures in the sergeant's huge ledger, you might have +proved that you were not in the wrong. But the only time I ever knew one +of these disputes to be thus put to the test I admit I wished that I had +refrained from so temerarious an adventure. Somehow or other I had +managed to come back to the ward with three clean pillow-cases fewer +than the tale of dirty ones I had taken away. And Sister was exceedingly +cross. The particular Sister whose drudge I was at that period was +rather apt to be cross; and this was one of her crossest days. She +threatened to "report" me, and in fact did so. I was not--as she seemed +to expect--shot at dawn. I merely underwent a formal reproof from a high +authority who perhaps (but this is a surmise) knew Sister's +idiosyncrasies even better than I did. There remained, nevertheless, the +pressing problem of the three strayed pillow-cases. These Sister +commanded me to obtain from the Clean Linen Store. But you cannot go to +the Clean Linen Store and say "Please give me three pillow-cases." The +Clean Linen Store either says "Why?" (a question which, under the +circumstances, is flatly unanswerable), or else tells you, in language +both firm and ornamental, that you have already had them: your initialed +chit testifies the fact. + +At all events, after some parley, the Clean Linen Store sergeant (who +was less of an ogre than he pretended) offered to strike a bargain with +me. If I would count all the pillow-cases, in and out of use, in my +ward, and bring him the total, he would compare the said total with the +figures in his ledger. Those figures he would not divulge to me. But if +the number I announced was three short of the number in his ledger, he +would give me the three, and say no more about it. + +The bargain seemed a fair one. In Sister's absence I spent a precious +half-hour of what should have been my "afternoon off" in counting all +the pillow-cases I could find in the ward. A good-natured probationer, +who sympathised with me in my difficulties (she too had suffered), +counted them also. A convalescent patient interested himself in the +problem: he also went the round of the beds, and investigated the +cupboard, counting all the pillow-cases. We three each arrived at the +same total. Armed with this total I marched back to the sergeant in the +Clean Linen Store. + +He turned up his ledger and ran his finger down the page till he came +to the entry of pillow-cases opposite to my ward. And then he laughed a +laugh of fiendish glee. + +"Do you know," he said, "that instead of having three pillow-cases too +few, you've seven too many!" + +Such are the traps set by the business man, the expert of ledgers, for +the innocent amateur. We had actually got more pillow-cases than we were +entitled to. All unwittingly, in my eagerness to placate Sister, I had +published the mild chicanery in which she had indulged on behalf of her +ward. The sergeant, growing grey in the solution of these abstruse +mathematical and psychological mysteries, had suspected this Sister all +along. He enlightened me. She had recently been transferred from another +ward--and in her going had (against the rules) wafted with her a small +selection of that ward's property.... And now there would be a surprise +stocktaking in her new ward: the seven surplus pillow-cases--and perhaps +other loot--would have to be explained. Sister, in short, was in for a +_mauvais quart d'heure_. + +It was a suitable penalty for her crossness. It should have taught her +the perils of crossness. With regret I add that she did not envisage the +episode in that light. She was merely rather crosser than before. It was +without any profound sorrow that I soon afterwards bade her farewell, on +her departure to overseas spheres of activity. But she had at least +afforded me a lesson in the importance of accuracy over my dirty and +clean linen bundles. Never again would I risk the ordeal of a surprise +stocktaking; never again would I risk a combat with a ledger-fortified +sergeant; never again would I risk any attempt at the tortuous in my +dealings with the classifications of the eighty-one items on the +tear-off leaf of that dire volume, the _Check Book for Hospital Linen_. + + + + +IX + +ON BUTTONS + + +In one of his recent books Mr. H.G. Wells expresses a surprised +annoyance at the spectacle of spurs. Vast numbers of military gentlemen +(he observed at the front) go clanking about in spurs although they have +never had--and never will have--occasion to bestride a horse. Spurs are +a symbolic survival, a waste of steel and of labour in manufacture, a +futile expenditure of energy to keep clean and to put on and take off. + +When I first enlisted I felt a similar irritation in regard to buttons. +His buttons are a burden to the new recruit. Time takes the edge off his +resentment. Time is a soother of sorrows, a healer of rancours, however +legitimate. Nevertheless one's buttons remain for ever a nuisance. I do +not complain that I should have to make my bed, polish my boots, keep +my clothes neat. These are the obvious decencies of life. But the daily +shining-up of metal buttons which need never have been made of metal at +all, which tarnish in the damp and indeed lose their lustre in an hour +in any weather, which, moreover, look much prettier dull than +bright--this is enough to convert the most bloodthirsty recruit into +obdurate pacifism. + +It is to be presumed that in the pipe-claying days of peace the hours +were apt to hang heavy in barracks, and the furbishing of buttons was +devised not alone for smartness' sake, but to occupy idle hands for +which otherwise Satan might be finding some more mischievous employment. +The theory--though it throws a lurid light on the unprofitableness of a +soldier's profession when there is no war to justify his existence--is +not devoid of sense. But why this custom, designed for that excellent +mortal, the T. Atkins who walked out with nurse-maids, and was none too +busy between-whiles, should be forced upon a totally different (if no +less estimable) T. Atkins whose job hardly gives him a moment for +meals--let alone for dalliance with the fair--I cannot pretend to +fathom. It is arguable that the ornamental soldier is suited by glossy +buttons and may properly lavish time and trouble thereupon. It is not +arguable that glossy buttons are a valid feature of the garb of a +humdrum and harassed hospital orderly. + +Many a time, footsore and aching with novel toil, I could have groaned +when, instead of lying down to relax, I had to tackle the polishing of +that idiotic panoply of buttons. My tunic had (it still has) five large +buttons in front, four pocket-flap buttons, two shoulder buttons, and +two shoulder numerals, "T.--R.A.M.C.--LONDON." My great-coat had (it +still has) five large front buttons, two shoulder buttons and two +shoulder numerals, three back belt buttons, two coat-tail buttons. My +cap had (it still has) a badge and two small strap-buttons. All these +must be kept brilliant. And, in addition, there was the intricate +brasswork of one's belt. + +Are the wounded any better looked after because a tired orderly has +spent some of his off-duty rest-hour in rubbing metal buttons which +would have been every bit as buttonable had they been made of bone? + +Many were the debates, in our hut, over the button problem. The +abolition of metal buttons being impracticable--the bold project of a +petition to the King and Lord Kitchener was never proceeded with--two +questions alone interested us: (1) which was the best polish, and (2) +which was the quickest and easiest system of polishing. The shabby +peddler-cum-boot-maker who had somehow established, at that period, a +monopoly of the minor trade of our camp, vended a substance (in penny +tins) called Soldier's Friend. This was a solidified plate-polish of a +pink hue. Having--as per the instructions--"moistened" it, in other +words, spat upon it, you worked up a modicum of the resulting pink mud +with an old toothbrush, then applied same to each button. When you had +rubbed a pink film on to the button you proceeded to rub it off again, +and lo! the tarnish had departed like an evil dream and the metal +glistened as if fresh from the mint. If you were very particular you +finished the performance with chamois leather. Thereafter you lost the +last precious five minutes before parade in efforts, with knife-blade or +clothesbrush, to remove from your tunic the smears of pink paste which +had failed to repose on the buttons and had stuck to the surrounding +cloth instead. Luckily, Soldier's Friend dries and cakes and powders off +fairly quickly. It is a lovable substance, in its simple behaviour, its +lack of complications. I surmise that somebody has made a fortune out of +manufacturing millions of those penny tins. There is at least one +imitation of Soldier's Friend on the market, and, like most imitations, +it is neither better nor worse than the original. Except for the name on +the outside of the tin, the two commodities cannot be told apart. No +doubt the imitator has likewise made a fortune. If so, both fortunes +have been amassed from a foible to whose blatant uselessness and +wastefulness even a Bond Street jeweller or a de-luxe hotel chef would +be ashamed to give countenance. + +One member of the hut's company, more fastidious than his fellows, +objected to expectorating on to his Soldier's Friend. Rather than do so +he would tramp the fifty yards to our wash-place and obtain a couple of +drops of water from the tap. (The same man thought nothing of keeping a +half-consumed ham, some decaying fruit, and an opened pot of Bovril all +wrapped in his spare clothes in his box under his bed. That is by the +way. I am here concerned not with human nature, but with buttons.) Plain +water, however, was voted less effective than the more popular liquid. +The scientifically minded had a notion that human spittle contained some +acid which Nature had evolved specially to assist the action of +Soldier's Friend. I am bound to say that I was of the anti-plain-water +party myself. For a space I became an adherent of the experimentalists +who moistened their Soldier's Friend with methylated spirit, alleging +that the ensuing polish was more permanent. I lapsed. My small bottle of +methylated spirit came to an end, and on reflection I was not sure that +its superiority over spittle had been proved. Nothing, in the English +climate, can make the sheen of metal buttons endure, at the +outside, more than one day. "Bluebell," "Silvo," and the other +chemico-frictional preparations in favour of which I ultimately +abandoned Soldier's Friend, are alike in this--that their virtue lies in +frequent application, diligence and elbow-grease. They are, every one, +excellent. Their inventors deserve our gratitude. But our gratitude to +their inventors must be nothing compared with their inventors' gratitude +to the person who decreed that the hard-pressed T. Atkins of the Great +War should wear (at least in part) the same needless finery as the +relatively otiose T. Atkins of Peace. May that despot, whoever he be, +depart to a realm of bliss--I suppose it would be bliss to him--where he +has to do hospital orderlies' chores in an attire completely composed of +tarnishing buttons, every separate one of which must hourly be brought +up to the parade standard of specklessness. + + + + +X + +A WORD ABOUT "SLACKERS IN KHAKI" + + +When the ambulances containing a new batch of wounded begin to roll up +to the entrance of the hospital they are received by a squad of +orderlies. To a spectator who happened to pass at that moment it might +appear that these orderlies had nothing else to do but lift stretchers +out of ambulances and carry them indoors. The squad of orderlies have an +air of always being ready on duty waiting to pounce out on any patient +who may arrive at any hour of the day or night and promptly transfer him +to his bed. I have known of a visitor, witnessing this incident, who +commented on it in a manner which showed that he imagined he had seen +our unit performing its sole function; he pictured us existing purely +and simply for one end--the carrying of stretchers up the front steps +into the building. He was kind enough to praise the rapidity with which +the job was done--but he held it to be a job which hardly justified the +enlistment of so considerable a company of able-bodied males. What, +exactly, we did with ourselves during the long hours when ambulances +were _not_ arriving, he failed to understand. I suppose he pictured us +twiddling our thumbs in some kind of cosy club-room situated in the +neighbourhood of the front door, from whence we could be summoned as +soon as another convoy hove in sight. + +The truth of the matter is quite otherwise. Arrivals of wounded, even +when they occur several times a day (I have known six hundred patients +enter the hospital in forty-eight hours), are far from being our chief +preoccupation. Admittedly they take precedence of other duties. The +message, "Convoy coming! Every man wanted in the main hall!" is the +signal for each member of the unit who is not engaged in certain +exempted sections to drop his work, whatever it is, and proceed smartly +to report to the sergeant-in-charge. The telephone has notified us of +the hour at which the ambulances may be expected; the hospital's +internal telephone system has passed on the tidings to the various +officials concerned; and, five minutes before the patients are due, all +the orderlies likely to be required must "down tools," so to speak, and +line-up at the door. They come streaming from every corner of the +hospital and of its grounds. Some have been working in wards, some have +been pushing trollies in the corridors, some have been shovelling coke, +some have been toiling in the cookhouse or stores, some have been +shifting loads of bedding to the fumigator, some have been on "sanitary +fatigue," some have been cleaning windows or whitewashing walls, some +have been writing or typing documents, some have been spending their +rest-hour in slumber or over a game of billiards. Whatever they were +doing, they must stop doing it at the word of command. + +If the convoy be a large one, its advent may even mean, for the +orderlies, the dread announcement, "All passes stopped." The luckless +wight whose one afternoon-off in the week this happens to be, and who +has probably arranged to tryst with a lady friend, finds, at the gate, +that he is turned back by the sentry. In vain he displays his pass, +properly signed, stamped and dated: the telephone has warned the sentry +(or "R.M.P."--Regimental Military Policeman) that the passes have been +countermanded. Until the convoy has been dealt with, the pass is so much +waste paper, and the unfortunate orderly's inamorata will look for him +and behold him not. How many painful misunderstandings this "All passes +stopped" law has given rise to, one shudders to guess. + +But indeed no war-hospital orderly ever arranges any appointment without +the proviso that he is liable to break it. The folk who imagine that the +hospital orderly enjoys a "cushy job" (to use the appropriate +vernacular) seldom make sufficient allowance for this painful aspect of +it. The ordinary soldier in training in an English camp has his evenings +free, and certain other free times, which are nearly as sure as the +sun's rising. The hospital orderly is _never_--in theory at any +rate--off duty. His free moments are regarded not as a right but as a +favour: no freedom, at any time, can be guaranteed. He is liable to be +called on in the middle of the night, or at the instant when he is going +off duty, or when at a meal, or when resting, or when on the point of +walking out in pursuance of the gentle art of courtship. And he must +respond, instanter, or he will find that he has earned the C.B.--which +in this instance means not Companion of the Bath, but Confined to +Barracks, a punishment as hard to bear as the cruel "keeping in" of our +school-days. + +Without presuming to compare either the importance or the onerousness of +the hospital orderly's work with that of the soldier capable of going to +the front to fight, I would here add that the critic who watches the +stretcher-carrying and thinks it a pity that able-bodied males should be +wasted on it, is doing the system (not to mention the men themselves) an +injustice. For the men whom he sees are not, as a matter of fact, +able-bodied, even though muscular enough to stand this short physical +effort. Excitable old gentlemen who believe that they can decide at a +glance whether a man is medically fit, and write to the Press about the +"shirkers" they think they have detected, were of the opinion, long +since, that the R.A.M.C. should be combed out. Certain journals made a +great feature of this proposal. Whatever may be the case elsewhere, I +can only say that as far as our unit was concerned it had already, +months before the newspaper agitation, been combed out five times; and +this in spite of the fact that, at the period when I enlisted, our +Colonel declined to look at any recruit who was not either over age or +had been rejected for active service. The unit was thus made up, even +then, of elderly men and of "crocks." (This was before the start of the +Derby Scheme and, of course, considerably before the introduction of +Universal Service.) Perhaps it is allowable to point the moral against +the "shirker"-discovering armchair patriots aforesaid: that no small +proportion of our unit was composed of over-age recruits who, instead +of informing the world at large that they wished they were younger, +"And, by Gad, I envy the lads their chance to do _anything_ in the +country's cause," did not rest until they had found an opening. In my +own hut there were two recruits over sixty years of age. Elsewhere in +the unit there were several over fifty. Our mess-room at meal times was, +and still is, dotted with grey-haired heads, not of retired army men +rejoined, but of men who, previous to the war, had lived comfortable +civilian lives. At a later date, when the few fit men that our +combings-out revealed had gone elsewhere, the unit was kept up to +strength by the drafting-in either of C3 recruits or of soldiers who, +having been at the front and been wounded, or invalided back, were +marked for home duty only. So much for the "slackers in khaki" which one +extra emphatic writer (himself not in khaki, although younger than +several of the orderlies here) professed to discover in the R.A.M.C. +Those "slackers" may be having an easier time of it than the heroes of +France, Gallipoli, Salonika, Egypt and Mesopotamia. But they are not +having so easy a time as some of their detractors. + +The hospital orderly is not (I think I may assert on his behalf) puffed +up with foolish illusions as to his place in the scheme of things. It is +a humble place, and he knows it. His work is almost comically +unromantic, painfully unpicturesque. Moreover--let us be frank--much of +it is uninteresting, after the first novelty has worn off. Work in the +wards has its compensations: here there is the human element. But only a +portion of a unit such as ours can be detailed for ward work: the rest +are either hewers of wood and drawers of water or else have their noses +to a grindstone of clerical monotonousness beside which the +ledger-keeping of a bank employee is a heaven of blissful excitements. +You will find few hospital orderlies who are not "fed up"; you will find +none who do not long for the war's end. And I fancy you will find very, +very few who would not go on active service if they could. On the +occasions when we have had calls for overseas volunteers, the response +has always exceeded the demand. The people who, looking at a party of +hospital orderlies, remark--it sounds incredible, but there _are_ people +who make the remark--"These fellows should be out at the front," may +further be reminded that "these fellows" now have no say in the choice +of their own whereabouts. Not a soldier in the land can decide where or +how he shall serve. That small matter is not for him, but for the +authorities. He may be thirsting for the gore of Brother Boche, and an +inexorable fate condemns him to scrub the gore of Brother Briton off the +tiles of the operating theatre. He may (but I never met one who did) +elect to sit snugly on a stool at a desk filling-in army forms or +conducting a card index; and lo, at a whisper from some unseen Nabob in +the War Office, he finds himself hooked willy-nilly off his stool and +dumped into the Rifle Brigade. This is what it means to be in khaki, and +it is hardly the place of persons not in khaki to bandy sneers about the +comfortableness of the Linseed Lancers whose initials, when not standing +for Rob All My Comrades, can be interpreted to mean Run Away, Matron's +Coming. The squad of orderlies unloading that procession of ambulances +at the hospital door may not envy the wounded sufferers whom they +transmit to their wards; but the observer is mistaken if he assumes that +the orderlies have, by some questionable manoeuvre, dodged the fiery +ordeal of which this string of slow-moving stretchers is the harvest. + + + + +XI + +THE RECREATION ROOMS + + +We rather pride ourselves, at the 3rd London, on the fame of our +hospital not merely as a place in which the wounded get well, but as a +place in which they also "have a good time." The two things, truth to +tell, are interlinked--a truism which might seem to need no labouring, +were it not for the evidence brought from more rigid and red-tape-ridden +establishments. A couple of our most valued departments are the "Old +Rec." and the "New Rec."--the old and new recreation rooms. The new +recreation room, a spacious and well-built "hut," contains three +billiard tables, a library, and current newspapers, British and +Colonial. This room is the scene of whist-drives, billiard and pool +tournaments, and other sociable ongoings. Sometimes there is an +exhibition match on the best billiard table: the local champion of +Wandsworth shows us his skill--and a very pretty touch he has: once the +lady billiard champion of England came, and defeated the best opponent +we could enlist against her--an event which provoked tremendous applause +from a packed congregation of boys in blue. + +The old recreation room is fitted with a permanent stage for theatricals +and concerts. It is also our "Movie Palace." (I think our hospital was +the first to instal a cinematograph as a fixture.) During the morning +the floor area is dotted with miniature billiard tables--which are never +for a moment out of use. In the afternoon these are removed; some +hundreds of chairs replace them; and at 4.30 we begin an +entertainment--music, a play (we have had Shakespeare here), lantern +slides, films, or what not. Those entertainments, which have continued +unbrokenly since the hospital began to function in 1914, constitute the +outstanding feature of the "good time" enjoyed by 3rd Londoners. The +"Old Rec." and its crowded concerts will be a memory cherished by hosts +of fighting men from the homeland and from overseas. + +In the original hospital plan--drawn up before the war--the Old Rec. +(which is a part of the main school building) was marked down to be a +ward of forty beds. Its structure, its internal geography, and the sheer +impossibility of providing it with the essential sanitary conveniences, +would make it unsuitable to be a ward of four beds, let alone of forty. +On this account its allotment for recreation purposes would be +excusable. But the Old Rec. and the New Rec. too, for that matter, +justify their superficial waste of bed-space on other--and +unanswerable--grounds. It is a mere matter of common sense to arrange +some centre to which the patient can repair and employ his leisure when +he is sufficiently well to potter about though not well enough to be +discharged from hospital. Instead of idling in his ward and disturbing +the patients who are still confined to bed--and who, often, are urgently +in need of quietness--the convalescent departs to one or other of the +recreation rooms, morning and afternoon, where he can make as much +noise as he likes and where he can meet and fraternise with his comrades +from every front. (What exchanging of stories those recreation rooms +have witnessed!) On the one hand, then, the seriously ill patient is not +annoyed by the rovings in the ward of the walking patients; and on the +other the walking patients are not irked by the necessity for keeping +quiet at a period when returning health stimulates them to a wholesome +desire for fun. Both kinds of patients, thus, may legitimately be said +to get better more quickly than they would have had a chance to do were +it not for the recreation rooms. It is within the writer's knowledge +that the medical staff of the hospital, on being consulted as to the +"bed value" of the recreation rooms, unanimously agreed that their +existence reduced the average sojourn of the hospital's inmates by a +definite "per day" ratio: that ratio, so far from showing a bed-space +waste, worked out at a per-annum gain of bed-space equivalent to a +ward--if such a colossal ward could conceived!--of upwards of 300 beds. +So much for a point which might not appear to be worth detailed +explanation, but which has here been glanced at in order that critics +(for, unbelievable though it sounds, there have been curmudgeons to +growl of spoiling the wounded by too much pleasure) may be answered in +advance. The recreation rooms are a paying investment both to the +hospital and to the State. This is our trump card in any "spoiling the +wounded" controversy--though I dare say that most of us would not, in +any case, care twopence whether the concerts and films and billiards +were an investment or an extravagance: nothing would stand in the way of +our ambition to provide the now proverbial "good time" for all the +guests of the 3rd London. + +Scores of concerts of an excellence which would have been noteworthy +anywhere have been presented to our assemblages of wounded in the Old +Rec. Singers, musicians, actors and actresses have come and given of +their best. Miss Hullah's Music in War Time Committee (that delightful +body), and Mr. Howard Williams's parties, are perhaps our greatest +regular standbys. Certain sections of the public know Mr. Howard +Williams's name as a famous one in other fields of activity: to +thousands of soldiers it is honoured as that of the man who tirelessly +organised scrumptious tea-parties, pierrot shows, exhibition boxing +contests, nigger troupe entertainments--a list of jollifications, +indoors in winter and in the open air in summer, infinite in variety and +guaranteed never once to fall flat. A curious Empire reputation, this of +Mr. Williams! + +Yesterday, for instance, a nigger troupe visited the hospital. To be +exact, they were the Metropolitan Police Minstrels ("By Permission of +Sir E.R. Henry, G.C.V.O., K.C.B., C.S.I., Commissioner"); but no member +of the audience, I imagine, could picture those jocose blackamoors, with +their tambourines and bones, as really being anything so serious as +traffic-controlling constables. That their comic songs were accompanied +by a faultless orchestra was understandable enough. One can believe in a +police band. One is not surprised that the police band is a good band. +To believe that the ebony-visaged person with the huge red +indiarubber-flexible mouth who sings "Under the archway, Archibald," and +follows this amorous ditty with a clog dance is--in his washed +moments--the terror of burglars, requires unthinkable flights of +imagination. As I gazed at this singular resurrection of Moore and +Burgess and breathless childhood's afternoons at the St. James's +Hall--the half circle of inanely alert faces the colour of fresh +polished boots--the preposterous uniforms and expansive +shirt-fronts--the "nigger" dialect which this strange convention demands +but which cannot be said to resemble the speech of any African tribe yet +discovered--I found that by no effort of faith or credulity could I +pierce the disguise and perceive policemen. + +It is at least twenty years since I met a nigger minstrel in the flesh. +Vague ghosts of bygone persons and of piquant anachronisms seemed to +float approvingly in the air: the Prince Consort, bustles, the high +bicycle, sherry, Moody and Sankey, the Crystal Palace, Labouchere, "Pigs +in Clover," Lottie Collins, Evolution, Bimetallism: hosts of forgotten +images, names and shibboleths came popping out from the brain's dusty +pigeon-holes, magically released by the spectacle of the nigger troupe. + +Yes, I was indeed switched into the past by Mr. Bones, Massa Jawns'n and +the rest. And yet the present might have seemed more emphatic and more +poignant. One felt, rather than saw, an audience of several hundred +persons in the dim rows of chairs. And laughing at the broad witticisms +of the niggers, or enjoying their choruses and orchestral +accompaniments, one forgot just what that half-glimpsed audience +consisted of; what it meant, and how it came to be here assembled. + +Of course when the lights were turned up in the interval, one beheld the +usual spectacle: stretchers, wheeled chairs, crutches, bandaged heads, +arms in splints, blind men, men with one arm, men with one leg: rank on +rank of war's flotsam and jetsam, British, Australians, New Zealanders, +Newfoundlanders, Canadians, come to make merry over the minstrels: in +the front row the Colonel and the Matron, with officer patients; here +and there an orderly or a V.A.D.; here and there a Sister with her +"boys." It was a family gathering. I descried no strangers, and no one +not in uniform--unless you count the men too ill to don their blue +slops: these had been brought in dressing-gowns or wrapped in blankets. +No mere haphazard audience, this, of anybody and everybody who chooses +to pay at a turnstile! Entrance to this hall is free ... but the price +is beyond money, all the same. + +A family party it was, decidedly. Thick fumes of tobacco smoke uprose +from it. (Shall we ever abandon the cigarette habit, now?) Orderlies +continued to arrive and stow themselves discreetly in corners: by some +strange providence each orderly had found that for a while he could be +spared from ward or office. Staff-Sergeants, Sergeants, +Corporals--mysteriously they made time to leave their various +departments. Even a bevy of masseuses (those experts eternally on the +rush from ward to ward) had peeped in to see the nigger minstrels. And +everybody was pleased: every jest and every conundrum got its laugh, +every ballad its applause. Not that we ever "give the bird" to those +who come to amuse us. Offer us skill in any shape or form--pierrots, +niggers, pianist, violinist, conjurer, ventriloquist, dancer, reciter: +any or all of these will be appreciated warmly. + +Yesterday, for the nigger minstrels, there were no empty chairs. Until, +in the midst of Part II ("A Laughable Sketch"--_vide_ the +programme--wherein female rôles were doubly coy by reason of the +masculinity of their falsetto dialogue and remarkable ankles) a +messenger stole hither and thither, whispering to the orderlies, who +promptly tiptoed from the room. + +A convoy of new arrivals demanded our presence. + +The silent ambulances were gliding up to the entrance of the hospital. +Orderlies, fetched from their jobs and from the entertainment, lined up +in the rain to take their places in the quartettes of bearers who lifted +out the stretchers. The Assistant Matron, standing in the shelter of the +door, checked her list; the Medical Officer handed out the ward tickets; +the lady clerks from the Admission and Discharge Office took the +patients' particulars. And the bathroom became very busy. + +As I started to wheel a much-bandaged warrior to his ward, the +recreation-room door opened and a burst of music-cum-essence-of-nigger +emerged on his astonished ears. I was a little doubtful as to whether +our new guest would not think his reception somewhat flippant in key. +The poor fellow was visibly suffering, and the sound of tambourines and +comedians' guffaws seemed a scarcely proper comment on his condition. I +might have spared myself these misgivings. "Say, chum," he interrogated +me feebly, "what's that noise?" "Nigger minstrels, old man." +"Golly!--and have I got to go straight to my bed?" + +Alas, he had to. It would be long before he could be well enough to be +taken to one of our entertainments. But, had he been given his way, he +would have gone direct from his fatiguing overseas journey into the Old +Rec. to join the family party and chuckle at Mr. Bones and Massa +Jawns'n.... No doubts assailed _his_ mind as to whether it was right to +"waste bed-space" on mere frivolities. A nigger minstrel show was to him +a deal more important, in fact, than his wound. And perhaps, in +instinct, he was not far wrong. + + + + +XII + +THE COCKNEY + + +Before I enlisted I was lodging in a house which it was occasionally +convenient to approach by a short cut through an area of slumland. One +night when traversing this slum--the hour was 1.30 a.m.--I was stopped +by a couple of women who told me that there was a man lying on the +ground in an adjacent alley; they thought he must be ill; would I come +and look at him? + +They led me down a turning which opened into a narrow court. This court +was reached by an arched tunnel through tenement houses. The tunnel was +pitchy black, but I struck matches as I proceeded, and presently we came +upon the object of my companions' solicitude--a young soldier, propped +against the wall and with his legs projecting across the flagstones. +The women had, in fact, discovered him by tripping over those legs in +the darkness. + +They were slatternly women, but warm-hearted; and when I had managed to +arouse the gentleman in khaki and hoist him to his feet (for the cause +of his indisposition was plain--and he had slept it off) they called +down blessings on my head and overwhelmed our friend with sympathy which +he did not wholly deserve and to which he made no rejoinder. Nor did he +vouchsafe any very lucid answer when I asked him whither he was bound. I +was prepared to pilot him--but I could hardly do so without knowing +towards which point of the compass he proposed to steer, or rather, to +be steered. "I know w'ere I wanter go," was all I could get out of him. +Very well; if he knew his address, it was no concern of mine; he could +lead on; I would act as a mere supporter. In this capacity, with my arm +linked firmly in his, I brought him forth from the tunnel to the street +(he had no wish, it seemed, to go through the tunnel into the court), +and here we bade farewell to the ladies. + +"Which way now?" I inquired. My charge responded not, but crossed to a +corner and meandered up one of those interminable thoroughfares which +lead out of London into the suburbs. Trudging with him and helping him +to sustain his balance, which was not as stable as could be wished, I +plied him with mildly genial conversation and at last elicited a few +vague answers. These were couched in the cockney idiom, but I caught a +faint nasal twang which led me to suspect that the speaker had come from +the other side of the Atlantic. Yes--he told me he had just arrived from +Canada. + +We had proceeded a short distance when on the further side of the street +I descried a golden halo which outlined the silhouette of a coffee +stall. It occurred to me that a cup of hot coffee would be a good tonic +to disperse the last symptoms of my friend's indiscretion, so I +deflected him across the road, and we brought up, together, alongside +the coffee-stall's counter. + +Lest the reader should be unacquainted with that unique creation, the +coffee-stall, I must explain that it is nocturnal in habit, emerging +from its lair only between the hours of 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. It is an +equipage of which the interior is inhabited by a fat, jolly man (at +least according to my experience he is always fat and jolly) surrounded +by steaming urns, plates of cake, buns of a citron-yellow hue, pale +pastries, ham sandwiches and packets of cigarettes. The upper panels of +one of its sides unfold to form a bar below and a penthouse roof above, +the latter being generally extended into an awning. The awning is a +protection for the customer not against the sun--a luminary from whose +assaults the London coffee-stalls have little to fear--but against the +rain. Thanks to these awnings, and the chattiness of the fat, jolly man, +and the warmth exhaled by the urns, and the circumstance that the public +houses are shut, our coffee-stalls are able to sell two brownish +beverages, called respectively coffee and tea, which otherwise could +hardly hope to achieve the honour of human consumption. + +Fate has guided me on many midnight pilgrimages through the town, and I +have imbibed, sometimes with relish, the liquids alluded to; I have also +partaken of the pallid pastry and the citron-yellow buns. I am therefore +in a position to write, for the benefit of persons less well informed, a +treatise on coffee-stalls. This I shall refrain from doing. The one +point it is necessary for me to mention is that the fat, jolly man, +being deplorably distrustful, does not supply casual customers with +teaspoons. You may have a cup of alleged tea (one penny) or a cup of +alleged coffee (one penny); a dollop of sugar is dropped into the cup; +the fat, jolly man gives the mixture a stir-round with a teaspoon; then +he places the cup before you on the bar; but the teaspoon is still in +his grasp. I dare say he would lend you the teaspoon if you requested +him to do so; but unless you have that audacity he prefers to keep the +teaspoon on his side of the bar, out of harm's way. This may seem +strange, when you perceive that the teaspoon is fashioned of a metal +unknown to silversmiths and might be priced at threepence. But even a +threepenny teaspoon is a souvenir which some collectors would not +despise. + +Presumably regular customers receive teaspoons, for teaspoons lie in a +heap on the fat, jolly man's side of the counter. This was the case at +the coffee-stall before which the young soldier and I ranged ourselves. +And the heap of teaspoons seemed to exercise a curious fascination upon +the soldier. He continued to stare at them for some minutes after I had +set in front of him his cup of coffee. Then he stared at the fat, jolly +man, who was cutting slabs from a loaf. He stared for a long time, +making no reply to my remarks. + +Rain began to patter on the awning--it had rained earlier in the +night--and I became aware of a figure, lurking in the background on the +pavement, beyond the awning's shelter, but within the radius of the haze +of light projected therefrom. It was a wretched, slinking figure, that +of an elderly man with bleared eyes and a red nose: one of those pariahs +who haunt cabstands and promote the cabs up the rank when the front +vehicle is hailed. This special specimen of his breed appeared to be a +satellite of the coffee-stall proprietor: perhaps he helped to tow the +stall to its berth. Whatever might be his function, he lingered on the +outskirts of the ring of light, watching us; and the young soldier, in +his slow scrutiny of the stall and its surroundings, caught sight of +him, and stared stolidly, as he had stared at everything else. + +I was in the act of drinking my coffee when the soldier suddenly leant +across the counter, picked up a spoon, turned, and threw it at the +derelict whose face wavered on the edge of the lamplight's circle. The +victim of this extraordinary attack dodged the missile, then grovelled +after it in the gutter. Meanwhile the fat man (instantaneously ceasing +to be jolly) gave vent to an angry protest. + +"Wotcher do _that_ for? Chuckin' my spoons abart! Drunk, that's wot you +are!" + +"Ain't drunk!" said the soldier. + +"Wotcher chuck my spoon at 'im for, then? 'E ain't done you no 'arm." + +"Yus 'e _'as_," was the soldier's surprising retort. + +"No 'e ain't." + +"Yus 'e _'as_." + +"No 'e 'ain't. 'E ain't done you no 'arm." + +To which the derelict chimed in (he had retrieved the spoon and now +advanced timidly with it under the awning): "I ain't done _you_ no +'arm"--a husky, whimpering chorus to his fat patron. + +The soldier fixed the derelict with a fierce glare. "Yus you _'ave_," he +reiterated. + +I was wondering how the dispute might develop, but evidently my ear is +unattuned to the nuances of these dialectics. The soldier's glare and +the soldier's tone must have betrayed themselves to the two other men as +factitious; the derelict, anyhow, lost his nervousness and, approaching +nearer, scanned the soldier with dim, peering eyes; then broke into a +joyous grin and exclaimed: + +"Lumme, if it ain't ol' Bert!" + +And the fat man, leaning on his counter, and likewise examining the +soldier, cried, "Ol' Bert it is!" + +"Knew you in two ticks," grunted Bert. "Same ol' 'Arry." (This was the +derelict.) "Same ol' 'Erb." (This was the fat--and once again +jolly--man.) + +Explanations ensued. Bert, the young soldier, was a native of these +parts. He had emigrated to Canada five years previously. To-night, _en +route_ for the front, he had returned. Earlier in the evening there had +been ill-advised libations; he had started for his home, felt sleepy, +sheltered from the wet in a tunnel quite familiar to him, and there been +discovered by the ladies and roused by myself. Arrived at the +coffee-stall he had recognised in its proprietor a former pal and +another former pal in 'Arry the derelict. To throw the spoon at 'Arry +was merely his playful mode of announcing his identity. + +I left the trio reviewing the past and exchanging news of the present. +My services, it was clear, would no longer be required by the prodigal. +He and his mates gave me a hearty good-night. + +I did not guess how intimate was soon to be my association with the +Berts and 'Arries and 'Erbs of the world. I was to be their servant, to +wait upon them, to perform menial tasks for them, to wash them and dress +them and undress them, to carry them in my arms. I was to see them +suffer and to learn to respect their gameness, and the wry, "grousing" +humour which is their almost universal trait. In my own wards, and +elsewhere in the hospital, I came in close contact with many cockneys of +the slums. Even when one had not precisely "placed" a patient of this +description, the relatives who came to him on visiting days gave the +clue to the stock from which he sprang. The mother was sometimes a +"flower girl"; the sweetheart, with a very feathered hat, and hair which +evidently lived in curling pins except on great occasions, probably +worked in a factory. These people, if the patient were confined to bed, +sat beside him and talked in a subdued, throaty whisper. But I have seen +the same sort of patient, well enough to walk about, meet his folks on +visiting afternoons at the hospital gate. There is a crowd at the +hospital gate, passing in and going out; hosts of patients are waiting, +some in wheeled chairs and some seated on the iron fence which fringes +the drive. The reunions which occur at that gate are exceedingly public. +Our East Ender is perhaps accustomed to publicity; his slum does not +conceal its feelings--it quarrels, and makes love, without drawn blinds, +and privacy is not an essential of its ardours. Be that as it may, these +meetings at the hospital gate, which are not lacking in pathos, have +sometimes manifested a tear-compelling comicality when the actors in the +drama belonged to the class which produced Bert. + +In a higher class there is restraint and a rather stupid bashfulness. I +have seen a wounded youngster flush apprehensively and only peck his +mother in return for her sobbing embrace. That is not Bert's way. He +knows--he is not a fool--that his mother looks a trifle absurd as, with +bonnet awry, she surges perspiringly past the sentries, the tails of her +skirt dragging in the dust and her feet flattened with the weight of +over-clad, unwholesome obesity they have to bear. But he hobbles sprily +to meet her, and his salute is no mere peck, but a smacking kiss, so +noisy that it makes everyone laugh. He laughs too--perhaps he did it on +purpose to raise a laugh: that is his quaint method; but the fact +remains that, whatever his motive, he has managed to please his mother. +She is sniffing loudly yet laughing also, and one could want no better +picture of human affection than this of Bermondsey Bert and his +shapeless, work-distorted, maybe bibulous-looking mother, exchanging +that resounding and ungraceful kiss at the hospital gate. I have heard +Bert shout "Mother!" from a hundred yards off, when he spied her coming +through the gate. No false shame there! No smug "good form" in that--nor +in the time-honoured jest which follows: "And 'ave you remembered to +bring me a bottle of beer, mother?" (Of course visitors are not allowed +to introduce alcohol into the hospital--otherwise I am afraid there is +no doubt that mother would have obliged.) + +In one of our wards we harboured, for a while, a costermonger. This +coster, an entertaining and plucky creature who had to have a leg +amputated, received no callers on visiting day: his own relatives were +dead and he and his wife had separated. "Couldn't 'it it orf," he +explained, and with laudable impartiality added, "Married beneath 'er, +she did, w'en she married me." As the lady was herself a coster, it was +plain that here, as in other grades of society, there are degrees, +conventions and barriers which may not be lightly overstepped. "Sister," +however, thought that the patient should inform his wife that he had +lost his leg, and prevailed on him to send her a letter to that effect. +A few days later he was asked, + +"Well, did you write and tell your wife you had lost a leg?" + +"Yus." + +"I suppose she's answered? What has she said?" + +"Said 'm a liar!" + +Her retort had neither disconcerted nor offended him. He was a +philosopher--and, like so many of his kind, a laughing philosopher. When +he was sufficiently recovered from his operation to get about on +crutches he was the wag of the ward. He took a special delight in those +practical jokes which are invented by patients to tease the nurses, and +devoted the most painstaking ingenuity to their preparation. It was he +who found a small hole in the lath-and-plaster wall which separates the +ward from the ward's kitchen. Through this hole a length of cotton was +passed and tied to the handle of a mug on the kitchen shelf. At this +period, owing to the Zeppelin raids, only the barest minimum of light +was allowed, and the night nurse, when she entered the kitchen, went +into almost complete darkness. No sooner was she in the kitchen and +fumbling for what she required than a faint noise--that of the cup being +twitched by the cotton leading to the mischievous coster's bed--arose on +the shelf and convinced her that she was in the presence of a mouse. She +retreated, and perhaps if any convalescent patient had been awake she +would have enlisted his aid to expel the mouse; but in the ward the +patients were, as one man, snoring vociferously. It was this slightly +overdone snoring, at the finish, which gave birth to suspicions and +caused the trick to be detected. + +The night nurses do not have a placid time of it if their patients +are at the stage of recovery when spirits begin to rise and +the early slumber-hour which the hospital rules prescribe is not +welcome. String-actuated knaveries, more or less similar to the +mouse-in-the-kitchen one, are always devised for the plaguing of a new +night nurse. Sometimes in the dead of night, when utter silence broods +over the ward, the gramophone will abruptly burst into raucous music: +its mechanism has been released by a contrivance which gives no clue to +the crime's perpetrator. The flustered nurse gropes her way down the +ward and stops the gramophone, every patient meanwhile sitting up in bed +and protesting against her cruelty in having awakened them by starting +it. Half an hour after the ward has quietened, the other gramophone +(some wards own two) whirrs off into impudent song: it also has been +primed. Nurse is wiser on future occasions: she stows the gramophones, +when she comes on duty, where no one can tamper with them. Even so, she +may have her nerves preyed upon by eerie tinklings, impossible to locate +in the darkness; these are caused by two knives, hung from a nail fixed +high up in the rafters. By jiggling a string, which is conducted over +another rafter and down the wall to his pillow, the patient makes the +knifeblades clash. Sometimes two strings, leading to different beds, +complete this instrument of torture. After a determined search, nurse +finds one string, and, having cut it, flatters herself that she has got +the better of her enemies. Not a bit of it. She has scarcely settled in +her chair again before the tinklings recommence. The second string is in +action; and as she hunts about the ward for the source of the melody in +the ceiling, muffled convulsions of mirth, from the dim rows of beds, +furnish evidence that her naughty charges are not getting the repose +which they require and to ensure which is part of the purpose of her +presence. + +A nurse who happens to be unpopular never has these pranks played upon +her. They are in the nature of a compliment. Nor do they occur in a +ward where there is a patient seriously ill. It is impossible to imagine +war-hospital patients acting inconsiderately towards a distressed +comrade. This observation renders all the more amusing the scandalised +concern which I once beheld on the demure physiognomy of a visiting +clergyman when he gathered the drift of certain allusions to a case on +the Danger List. + +The name of the Danger List explains itself. When a patient is put on +the Danger List, his relatives are sent for and may be with him whether +it is the visiting afternoon or not. (If they come from the provinces +they are presented with a railway pass and, if poor, are allotted +lodgings near the hospital, a grant being made to them from our +Benevolent Fund.) For the information of the V.A.D.'s who answer +visitors' questions in the Enquiry Bureau at the main entrance to the +hospital, a copy of the Danger List hangs there, and it is on record +that an awestruck child, seeing this column of patients' names, and +reading the heading, asked, "What does 'Danger List' mean? Does it mean +that it's dangerous to go near them?" Now in Ward C 22 a patient, a +cockney, was on the Danger List--which circumstance availed nothing to +depress his spirits. In spite of considerable pain, he poked fun at the +prospect of his own imminent demise, and was himself the chief offender +against the edict of quietness which "Sister" had issued for her ward. +He _would_ talk; and he _would_ talk about undertakers, post-mortems, +epitaphs and the details of a military funeral. "That there top note of +the Last Post on the bugle doesn't 'arf sound proper," he said--a +verdict which anyone who has heard this beautiful and inspired fanfare, +which is the farewell above a soldier's grave, and which ends on a +soaring treble, will endorse. "But," he went on, "if the bugler's 'ad a +drop o' somethin' warm on the way to the cemetery, that there top note +always reminds me of a 'iccup. An' if 'e 'iccups over me, I shall wanter +spit in 'is eye, blimey if I won't." + +This persiflage had been going on for a couple of days and getting to be +more and more elaborate and allusive, infecting the entire ward, so +that the fact that the man was on the Danger List had become a kind of +catchword amongst his fellows. Entered, in all innocence, the clergyman. +("The very bloke to put me up to all the tricks!"--from the irreverent +one.) At the same moment a walking patient, also a cockney, who had been +reading a newspaper, gave vent to a cry of feigned horror. "Boys!" he +announced, "it says 'ere there's a shortage of timber!" + +Guffaws greeted this sally. Everyone saw the innuendo at once--everyone +except the clergyman, and when he grasped the point, that Ol' Chum +So-and-So was on the Danger List and a shortage of timber was supposed +to imply that he might be done out of a coffin, he was visibly shocked. +Perhaps he did not understand cockney humour.... However, one may add +that our irrepressible friend, at the moment of writing, is off the +Danger List (albeit only after a protracted struggle with the Enemy at +whom he jeered), and is now contriving to be as funny about life as he +was funny--and fearless--about Death. + +I caught sight to-day of another cockney acquaintance of mine, whose +Christian name is Bill, trundling himself down the hospital drive in a +wheeled chair. Perched on the knee of his one leg, with its feet planted +on the stump which is all that is left of the other, was his child, aged +four. Beside him walked his wife, resplendent in a magenta blouse and a +hat with green and pink plumes. + +The trio looked happy, and Mrs. Bill's gala attire was symbolical. When +Bill was in my ward he too was on the Danger List. I remember that when +he first came to us, before his operation, and before he took a turn for +the worse, his wife visited him in that same magenta blouse (or another +equally startling) and that for some reason she and "Sister" did not +quite hit it off, "had words," and subsequently for a period were not on +speaking terms. Later, when Bill underwent his operation, and began to +sink, his bed was moved out on to the ward's verandah. Here his wife +(now wearing a subdued blouse) sat beside him, hour after hour, while +little Bill, the child, towed a cheap wooden engine up and down the +grass patch, oblivious to the ordeal through which his parents were +passing. It was my business, as orderly, to intrude at intervals upon +the scene on the verandah, to bring Bill such food as he was able to +tolerate. On the first occasion, after Bill's collapse, that I prepared +to take him a cup of tea, Sister stopped me. "Don't forget to take tea, +and some bread and butter, to that poor woman. She looks tired. And some +milk for the child." "Very good, Sister." I cut bread-and-butter, and +filled an extra mug of tea. "Orderly! What are you doing?" Sister had +reappeared. And I was rebuked because I was going to offer Mrs. Bill her +tea in a tin mug (the patients all have tin mugs) and had cut her +bread-and-butter too thick. I must cut dainty slices of thin +bread-and-butter, use Sister's own china ware, and serve the whole +spread on a tray with a cloth. All of which was typical of Sister, who +from that day treated Bill's wife with true tenderness; and Bill's wife +became one of Sister's most enthusiastic adorers. + +It came to pass, after a week of pitiful anxiety, that the Medical +Officer pronounced Bill safe once more. "Bloke says I'm not goin' ter +peg art," he told me. I congratulated him and remarked that his wife +would be thankful when he met her, on her arrival, with such splendid +news. "I'll 'ave the larf of my missus," said Bill. "W'en she comes, I +shall tell 'er I've some serious noos for 'er, and she's ter send the +kid darn on the grarse ter play. Then I'll pull a long fice and hask 'er +ter bear up, and say I'm sorry for 'er, and she mustn't tike it too +rough, and all that; and she 'as my sympathy in 'er diserpointment: _she +ain't ter get 'er widow's pension arter all_!" + +I believe that this programme was carried through, more or less to the +letter. Certain it is that I myself overheard another of Bill's grim +pleasantries. He was explaining to madame that they must apprentice +their offspring to the engineering trade. "I wanter mike Lil' Bill a +mowter chap, so's 'e can oil the ball-bearings of me fancy leg wot I'm +ter get at Roehampton." The "fancy leg" ended by being the favourite +theme of Bill's disgraceful extravaganzas. He would announce to Sister, +when she was dressing his stump, that he had been studying means of +earning his living in the future, and had decided to become a professor +of roller skating. He would loudly tell his wife that she would never +again be able to summons him for assault by kicking: the fancy leg would +not give the real one sufficient purchase for an effective kick. And she +was not to complain, in future, about his cold feet against her back in +bed: there would be only one cold foot, the other would be unhitched and +on the floor. And of course there were endless jokes about what had been +done with the amputated leg, whether it had got a tombstone, and so +forth: some of the suggestions going a trifle beyond what good taste, in +more fastidious coteries, would have thought permissible. But Bill had +his own ideas of the humorous, and maybe his own no less definite ideas +of dignity. In this latter virtue I counted the fact that although once +or twice, when he was very low, he gave way to a little fretting to me, +he never, I am convinced, let fall one querulous word in the presence of +his wife. She sat by her husband's side, and when things were at their +worst the two said naught. The wife numbly watched her Bill's face, +turning now and then to glance at the activities of little Bill with his +engine, or to smile her thanks to the patients who sometimes came and +gave the child pickaback rides. When I intruded, I knew I was +interrupting the communings of a loving and happily married pair; and +the "slangings" of each other which signalised Bill's recovery and his +wife's relief, did nothing to shake my certitude that, like many slum +dwellers, they owned a mutual esteem which other couples, of superior +station, might envy. + +Personally I have never known a cockney patient who did not evoke +affection; and as a matter of curiosity I have been asking a number of +Sisters whether they liked to have cockneys in their wards. Without a +single exception (and let me say that Sisters are both observant and +critical) the answers have been enthusiastically in the affirmative. + + + + +XIII + +THE STATION PARTY + + +An earnest shopman not long ago tried to sell me a pair of +marching-boots, "for use"--as he explained, lest their name should have +misled me--"on the march." Had he said "for use after the war" he might +have been more persuasive. When I told him that marching-boots were no +good to me, it was manifestly difficult for him to conceal his opinion +that, if so, I had no business to flaunt the garb of Thomas Atkins. When +I added that if he could offer me a pair of running-shoes I might +entertain the proposition, his look was a reproach to irreverent +facetiousness. + +A grateful country has presented me with one pair of excellent +marching-boots. But a hospital ward is no place in which to go clumping +about in footgear designed to stand hard wear and tear on the +high-roads; and my army boots, after two years, have not yet needed +re-soling. I wore them, it is true, during my period of service with the +Chain Gang, as a squad of outdoor orderlies, engaged in road-making, was +locally called. And I wear them when we have a "C.O.'s Parade"--an +occasion on which naught but officially-provided attire is allowable. It +would take a century of C.O.'s parades, however, to damage boots put on +five minutes before the event and taken off five minutes after: the +parade itself necessitating no sturdier pedestrianism than is involved +in walking less than a hundred yards to the ground and there standing +stock-still at attention. + +I do not say that hospital orderlies never go for a march: only that +marching bulks relatively so small in our programme that any special +equipment for the purpose sounds a little ironical. The issue of +ward-shoes, now, was a real boon. Not that all the pairs with which our +unit was suddenly flooded by the authorities proved as silent as they +were intended to be. Some of them squeaked; and the peregrinations of +the orderly thus afflicted were perhaps more vexatious to the ear of a +nervous patient at night than even the clatter of honest hobnails. And +the soles were thin. A pair of ward-shoes lasted me on the average one +month. If only worn within the ward they might have lasted +longer--though not so very much longer. According to regulations, you +were not allowed to wear ward-shoes except within the confines of the +ward. No doubt it was expected that every time you were sent on an +errand outside the ward you would solemnly take off your ward-shoes and +put on your marching-boots--then, on the return, take off your +marching-boots and put on your ward-shoes--but life as a nursing orderly +is too short for such elaborations of etiquette. It was nothing unusual, +when one was working in a ward which lay at a distance of quarter of a +mile from the hospital's main building, to be sent to the said main +building a dozen times in a single morning. This incessant +message-bearing had to be done, if not at the double, at any rate at +nothing slower than five miles per hour in the morning (the busy time); +in the afternoon a speed of four miles per hour might sometimes be +permissible. At all events, running-shoes, as I told the shopman, would +not have been inappropriate during certain periods of crisis. + +From time to time our tasks were interrupted by the notes of a bugle--or +the shrilling of the Sergeant-Major's whistle--demanding our presence +for an intake of new patients. A party of orderlies was wanted to go to +the railway-station to help to remove stretcher-cases from the ambulance +train. The station lies at a distance of a mile from the hospital, and +this small pilgrimage, achieved a few score times, is practically all I +know of the veritable employment of marching-boots. + +I regretted when a change of plans diverted the ambulance trains to the +central termini for evacuation. The interlude of a station-party trip +was far from unwelcome. Lined up on the parade ground we were put in +charge of a corporal. "Party, 'shun! Right turn! Quick march!" Off we +trudged, round the back of the hospital, down the drive, out past the +sentry and away along the road. Presently, "Party, march at ease!" +Cigarettes were lit, talking was allowed, and someone would raise a +tune. How pleasant it is to march to singing! To march to a +drum-and-fife band must be wonderful. Or a brass band--! Those joys will +never be mine. Almost all the marching I shall have done in the great +war will be summed up in these tiny promenades from the hospital to the +railway-station, their rhythm sustained by self-raised choruses, none +too melodious. + +Occasionally an officer would be descried, on the pavement. Then "Party, +'shun!" Cigarettes were concealed. The song died. "Eyes left! ... Eyes +front! Party, march at ease!" The cigarettes reappeared, the song was +resumed. Approaching the station, "Party, 'shun!" Cigarettes were thrown +away. Here, in the chief street, we must make a smart show. A crowd is +gathered round the station gate, attracted by the array of Red Cross +vehicles within. Police are keeping back the curious. The way is +cleared for our arrival. "Left wheel!" Now is our one moment of glory. +We swing round, through the lane of gaping sightseers, and tramp-tramp +in style across the station yard and under the archway, flattering +ourselves (perhaps not without justification) that there are spectators +whose eyes pursue us with secret envy at the serious import of our task. + +The station platform, when we reached it, was generally a blank +perspective devoid of all living creatures except ourselves. Fate +decreed that we should be summoned long before the train was due. I have +kicked my heels for many a doleful hour on that platform, and the +reflection that "they also serve who only stand and wait" was chilly +comfort if--as frequently happened--we had been hurried off dinnerless. +The convoys' arrivals always seemed to coincide with dinner-time. On our +return to the hospital we should find that the rations had been kept hot +for us. But, in the meanwhile, an empty stomach was a poor preparation +for the strain of carrying stretchers up the stairs from the station +platform to the ambulances; and those of us who could produce pennies +for automatic-machine chocolate gained an instant popularity. The +longest period of waiting drew to an end at last, however. The platform +assumed a livelier air. The station-master appeared from his den. +Officers of the Army Medical Service and the Red Cross strolled down. +And the stairs and platform echoed to the pattering of the feet of hosts +of industrious "Bluebottles," fetching stretchers and blankets. + +The blue-uniformed volunteers who form a portion of the London Ambulance +Column are nicknamed the Bluebottles in allusion to their dress. It is a +nickname which, let me say at once, any man might be proud of. I know +not whether the history of the Bluebottles has yet been written, but +certain it is that their doings have got into newspaper print less often +than they deserved. For theirs is a double rôle which truly merits the +country's admiration. While carrying on the commerce of the Empire--that +vital commerce without which there would be bankruptcy and no sinews of +war, nor indeed any England left to defend--they have vowed themselves +also, of their own free-will, to the helping of the wounded. Day or +night the Bluebottle is liable to be called from his desk or his home by +the telephone: like the Florentine Brother of the Misericordia he must +instantly hurry into his uniform and rush to the place appointed. He may +be busy or he may be tired; no matter: his vow holds good. Off he goes, +to the railway-station to meet the hospital train and evacuate its +stretchers. + +Myself, I have the deepest respect for the Bluebottles and for their +energy in a cause which must often be not only fatiguing, but, from a +commercial point of view, extremely inconvenient. It would be absurd to +pretend, nevertheless, that the less responsible khaki-wearing R.A.M.C. +do not cherish a mild contempt for all Bluebottles. There is no reason +for that contempt. It is idiotic, childish--a humiliating exhibition of +the silliness of masculine human nature. Members of our station-party +who had enlisted but a week back, and who knew nothing whatever of +their work, would, in a whisper, mock the Bluebottles--although every +Bluebottle had taken first-aid classes and passed examinations at which +most of the mockers would have boggled. The Bluebottles were "civilians" +... there you have it. We--who would probably never do any battlefield +soldiering in our lives--looked down on all civilians who had the +impudence to wear a uniform of any sort. Such is the behaviour of the +sterner sex at a moment when its sole thought should be of sensible and +efficient co-operation in the performance of duty. + +For of course it was our duty to co-operate with the Bluebottles. The +theory with which we beguiled ourselves, that the Bluebottles were +physically starvelings and required our Herculean aid to lift the +stretchers up the stairs, was palpably nonsense. Still we told ourselves +that we, as disciplined soldiers, were here to give a hand to a civilian +mob who might otherwise faint and fail. A singular delusion! Time has +proved its falsity, for with the issue of fresh orders our +station-parties ceased to function: the Bluebottles now make shift +without us--and without, as far as I know, any mishap. + +The hospital train was eventually signalled. We were ranked, at +attention, at the foot of the stairs. The Bluebottles stood by their +stretchers. There was hurrying hither and thither of officials. +Sometimes our Colonel, having motored from the hospital, appeared on the +platform to see that all was well, and you may be sure that we +endeavoured to look alert in his august presence. And finally the train +glided into the station. + +The hospital trains seemed to be never twice the same: South Westerns, +North Westerns, Great Northerns, Midlands, Great Centrals, Lancashire +and Yorkshires--I saw them all, at one time or another, their sole +affinity being the staring red crosses painted on each coach. A coach or +two consisted of ordinary compartments, for sitting-up cases; the rest +were vans the interiors of which had been converted into wards by means +of bunks. Access to each van-ward was gained by a wide pair of sliding +doors in its centre. These doors, when the train had come to a +standstill, were opened by pallid-looking orderlies, who lowered +gangways and then gazed forth at us, while they awaited orders, with the +lack-lustre eyes of men who had been deprived of the proper allowance of +sleep. + +As soon as the list of the Medical Officer on the train had been checked +with that of the Medical Officer on the platform, the evacuation began. +Walking-cases were sent off first--generally a tatterdemalion crew, +hobbling and shuffling along the platform, and, at one stage of the war, +with trench mud still clinging to their clothes. They seldom needed our +assistance: the Bluebottles (even if feeble folk) were deemed by our +corporal to be fit to give any weak walking patient an arm, or carry his +kit. The walking patients, in fact, were a mere episode. Motor-cars +whirled them off, five or six at a time, and they might be half through +the process of being bathed at the hospital before the last +stretcher-case was quit of the train. The stretcher cases were our +concern. Pairs of Bluebottles, each carrying a stretcher, entered the +van-wards and anon reappeared with their burden. Now came our cue to +act. As the stretcher approached the foot of the stair two of our number +stepped forth from the rank, each taking a handle from a Bluebottle; the +stretcher thus proceeded on its course up the stair carried by four men, +one on each handle--two Bluebottles and two R.A.M.C.'s. + +That flight of iron stairs from the platform to the road seemed no very +arduous ordeal for the first half-dozen journeys. There was a knack +about keeping the stretcher horizontal: the front bearers must hold +their handles as low as possible; the rear bearers must hoist their +handles shoulder-high. It was all plain sailing and perfectly easy. Four +men to a stretcher is luxurious. At least it is luxurious on the level, +and if you have not far to go and not many consecutive stretchers to +carry. But when the convoy was a large one, when the bearers were too +few and you had no sooner got rid of one stretcher than you must run +down the stairs and, without regaining your breath, grab the handle of +another and slowly toil up again to the ambulances ... yes, even on the +coldest day it was possible to be moist with perspiration; and as for +the hot weather of the 1915 summer, when one of our Big Pushes was +afoot, or when returned prisoners came from Germany (those were +memorable occasions!)--you might be pardoned a certain aching in the +arm-muscles. + +It was on one of these busy days that I discovered that the comical +prejudice of khaki against the Bluebottles was not (as I had hitherto +supposed) confined to the young swashbucklers of the home-staying +R.A.M.C. It was seldom our custom to enter the hospital trains. An +unwritten law decreed that Bluebottles only should enter the train: the +R.A.M.C. limited themselves to carrying work outside, on the platform +and stair. But on this occasion the supply of Bluebottles had, for the +moment, run short, and our party took a turn at going up the gangways +and evacuating the van-wards. As it happened, I and my mate on the +stretcher were the first khaki-wearers to invade that particular +van-ward. And as we steered our stretcher in at the door and down the +aisle of cots a shout arose from the wounded lying there: "Here are some +real soldiers!" + +It was too bad. It was base ingratitude to the devoted band of +Bluebottles who had, up till that instant, been toiling at the +evacuation of the ward--and who, as I chanced to know, had been up all +the previous night, carrying stretchers at Paddington and Charing Cross, +while _we_ slept cosily. But--well, there it was. "Here are some real +soldiers!" Khaki greeted khaki--simultaneously spurning the mere +amateur, the civilian. I could have blushed for the injustice of that +naïve cry. But it would be dishonest not to confess that there was +something gratifying about it too. It was the cry of the Army, always +loyal to the Army. These heroic bundles of bandages, lifting wild and +unshaven faces from their pillows, hailed _me_ (a wretched creature who +had never heard a gun go off) as one of their comrades! My mate and I, +as we adjusted our stretcher at a cot's side, and braced ourselves +against the weight of the patient, winked covertly at one another. "A +nasty one for the Bluebottles!" he said. And it was. + +All the same I seize this opportunity of offering my homage to the +Bluebottles. They have done--are still doing--their bit, and that right +nobly. Thousands of British soldiers have cause to bless them and also +to be thankful for the existence of that great voluntary institution, +the London Ambulance Column. + + * * * * * + +When at last the train had been emptied and the ultimate stretcher was +_en route_ for the hospital, our party gathered once more at the top of +the stair, lined up, and was glanced-over by the corporal lest any man +had seized the opportunity to play truant. There were occasions when +some thirsty soul, chafing at the rigours of the strict teetotalism +enforced by our rules, was found to have vanished in the hurly-burly: +his destination, the up-platform refreshment-bar, being readily +surmisable. He had cause to regret his lapse if it were noticed before +he slipped back unostentatiously into our ranks. Then, "Party, 'shun! +Left turn! Right incline--quick march!" Off we swung, out into the +streets--cheered by the urchins who still hovered round the gate--and +so, at the rapidest possible pace, home to dinner and a smoke: these (in +my case at any rate) being preceded by the thankful relinquishment of my +seldom-worn and therefore none too friendly marching-boots. + + + + +XIV + +SLANG IN A WAR HOSPITAL + + +Every ward in the hospital has a bathroom attached to it, but in +addition to these there are two large bathrooms, each containing a +number of baths, which are used by walking patients and also by the +orderlies. The more recently built of these bathrooms is divided into +private cubicles. In the older one the baths are on a more sociable +plan, with no partition walls sundering them. The spectacle, in the +"old" bathroom, when a convoy of walking cases has arrived, is one which +should appeal to a painter. Clouds of steam fill the air, and through +the fog you perceive a fine mêlée of figures, some half dressed, some +statuesquely nude, towelling themselves or preparing to wash, or shaving +at bits of mirror propped on the window-sills. Pink bodies wallow +voluptuously in the deep porcelain-ware tubs, which are of the shape and +superb dimensions of Egyptian sarcophagi. Sometimes a patient with a +wounded arm, unable to help himself, is being soaped and sponged by an +orderly; or you may see a cheerful soul, with an injured foot, balanced +on the rim of the bath and giving himself all the ablutions which are +practicable without the disturbance of bandages. No one who has +frequented our bathrooms would ever doubt that the British Army loves +cleanliness and hot water. Of cold water I cannot speak with the same +enthusiasm. + +A newly-arrived convoy of course monopolises the bathroom; but +throughout the whole day, at almost any hour, you will find a patient or +two here; for by the rule of the hospital it is allowable for any +patient--once he has been given permission to take an unsupervised bath +at all--to take a bath whenever he likes. Consequently it happens often +that half a dozen orderlies may be bathing at the same time as half a +dozen patients--and it need not be added that the occasion is one for +pleasant chats and the barter of anecdotes. For this reason, if for no +other, I always elected to use the "old" bathroom: the "new" one, with +its closed cubicles, was less fruitful in conversations. + +The "old" bathroom was the exchange (and perhaps the starting-point) of +many of our hospital rumours. I imagine that every war hospital is a +hotbed of rumours. Ours certainly was, and is. Amongst the orderlies +there are incessant rumours about promotions, about the chances of the +unit being sent abroad, about surprise inspections, about the imminent +arrival of impossibly large convoys, about news--received privately by +the Colonel over the telephone--of defeats or victories. Nine times out +of ten the rumour turns out to be groundless. But this does not cause +the output of rumours to diminish. Apparently the army is a prolific +soil for rumours, inasmuch as they have a special name: a rumour is +called a _buzz_. "Only a buzz" ("it's only a rumour") is an expression +often heard on the lips of soldiers. In India it is sometimes "a bazaar +buzz" (a rumour circulating in the bazaars); here it is, naturally, a +bathroom buzz. + +Many were the choice examples of slang and of colloquialisms which I +culled in the bathroom, sitting comfortably in my bath and communing +with my neighbour in the next bath. I remember one morning making the +acquaintance of an Australian who had recently recovered from a bad +attack of trench feet. Four of the toes of one foot were missing, and +the fifth looked far from sound. My friend was examining this lonely toe +with a critical gaze, and I sympathised with him over its condition. +"Ah!" he said, "that toe is a king to what it was." He went on to tell +me (what I could well believe) that to get your "plates of meat" +frostbitten wasn't such a "cushy wound" as it was cracked up to be by +those who had never experienced its sufferings. "When I went sick the +doctor thought he'd rumbled me swinging the lead. But as soon as he +spotted them there toes of mine--the ones that's gone--I could see he +knew I'd clicked a packet, square dinkum, this trip." ("Square dinkum" +or "dinkum" is an Antipodean verbal flourish, which broadly +approximates to the American "Sure enough" or the English "Not 'arf.") + +Certain of these neologisms are common enough in civilian life--have +been imported into the army since 1914--but others (and the more +interesting ones, as I hold) were, until the war, limited to the +barrack-room. British regiments which had been abroad used an argot of +considerable antiquity, some of it of Oriental origin (_e.g._ "blighty," +meaning "home": hence "a blighty wound," or simply "a blighty," an +injury sufficiently serious to cause the victim to be invalided to +England). Whether the derivations of army slang have been investigated I +do not know. It appears to me to be a subject worth examination. I am +not myself a philologist, but in the bathrooms and elsewhere in the +hospital I have heard and noted a small collection of slang phrases and +idioms, and these may be worth recording. Such expressions as "swinging +the lead" (malingering or deceiving or acting in a hypocritical manner +or getting the better of anyone) have lost their novelty. So has +"rumbled," which means to be discovered or detected or found out. These +words have now spread far beyond the confines of the army. And indeed +the rapidity with which all slang and all catch-phrases can be +disseminated offers a rather alarming prospect. For whereas, before the +war, slang at its silliest was often quite local, nowadays its +restriction within given localities has in the nature of things become +impossible. A war hospital such as ours contains inmates from every +county in Britain, as well as from every colony. The same intermingling +occurs on an infinitely greater scale in training-camps and at the +various fronts. All these centres are hotbeds of slang: the men go home +from them, carrying to their native places slang which would never, in +ordinary times, have penetrated there. In the army you will hear a +Scotchman doing what he never did before--dropping his aitches. He has +caught it from his English comrades. You will hear him say "Not +'arf"--an inane tag which, despite its popularity in London, failed to +find any foothold north of the Tweed before the war. "Not 'arf" was +mouthed by Sassenach comedians on the music-hall stages of Edinburgh +and Glasgow, and was grinned at for what it was worth: the streets did +not adopt it. Now the streets will hear it and will use it: it is one of +Jock's souvenirs from his campaign. + +I am afraid that another triviality which has hitherto been to the taste +only of the south of England is fated to "catch on," by means of the +same missionaries, from Land's End to John o' Groat's, and even in the +colonies. Rhyming slang is extraordinarily common in the army, so common +that it is used with complete unconsciousness as being correct +conversational English. My friend of the king-like toe spoke of his feet +as "plates of meat"--and this though he was an Australian, not a +cockney. If he had had occasion to allude to his leg he would probably +have called it "Scotch peg." A man's arm is his "false alarm"; his nose, +"I suppose"; his eye, "mince pie"; his hand, "German band"; his boot, +"daisy root"; his face "chevvy chase"; and so forth--an interminable +list. What exactly was the _raison d'être_ of this pseudo-poetic mania I +do not know, but I suspect that it originated, in the distant past, +with the poverty of rhyme-invention on the part of the writers of the +cruder kind of pantomime songs--"round the houses," for example, being +both a rhyme to and a synonym for "trousies" (garments beloved of those +bards!)--and thus the vogue developed. This is only a theory. The one +thing certain is that a clumsy form of slang, devoid of the humour and +compactness which justify slang--and which were on the whole once +characteristic of metropolitan slang--has tickled the ear of some +millions of men who, but for the war, would never have fallen under its +temptation. The only thing to hope for is that it will run its course +and perish--like "What ho, she bumps!" and "Now we shan't be +long!"--without leaving any visible and permanent trace upon the +language. + +"Clicked," another word used by my trench-feet associate, resembles much +modern slang in the breadth and elasticity of its application. To click +can be either advantageous or baneful, according to the circumstances. A +soldier asks a superior for a favour, and it is granted. That soldier +has clicked. Or if he finds a nice girl to walk out with, he has +clicked. Or if he is given a coveted post, he has clicked. But he has +also clicked if he is suddenly seized on to do some menial duty. He has +clicked if he is discovered in a misdeed. And he has clicked a packet if +he gets into trouble generally. On such an occasion, it may be added, +the N.C.O. or officer who administers a reproof ("ticks him off"), and +does so in angry terms, "goes in off the deep end." + +Not all army slang is lacking, indeed, in a facetious irony. Miserable +conditions in the desert or in the trenches, bad accommodation, doubtful +food--anything which cannot arouse the faintest enthusiasm of any +sort--these, in the lingo of our now much-travelled and stoical troops, +are "nothing to write home about." Surely there is an admirable spirit +in this sarcasm. It crops up again in the hospital metaphor "going to +the pictures." That is Tommy's way of announcing that he is to go under +the surgeon's knife, on a visit to the operating theatre. Again, there +is a sardonic tang in the army's condemnation of one who has been +telling a far-fetched story: he has been "chancing his arm" (or "mit"). +Similarly one detects an oblique and wry fun in the professional army +man's use of the word "sieda" to mean "socks." (The new army more feebly +dubs them "almond rocks.") "Sieda" has been brought by the Anzacs from +Cairo, and with them it means "Good morning!"--a mere friendly hail, now +used with great frequency. But the veterans of older expeditions in +Egypt and in India, when they had been on the march, took their socks +from their perspiring feet and lay down to sleep; and in the +morning--well, their socks said "Sieda!" to them when they awoke, and +were christened accordingly.... Or again, the socks (or other property) +might have vanished in the night--in which case there had been "hooks +about" (pilferers about). If one of those "hooks" were caught, he would +be first "rammed in the mush" (put in the guardroom), and then, if his +guilt were established, he would be observed "going over the wall" or +"going to stir" (going to the detention prison). + +A few other slang words which I have come across in the hospital, and +which seem to me to bear the mark of the old army as distinct from the +new, are: "bondook," a rifle; "sound scoff" (to the bugler, to sound +Rations); "scran," victuals, rations; "weighing out," paying out; +"chucking a dummy," being absent; "get the wind up," be afraid (and "put +the wind up," make afraid); "the home farm," the married quarters; +"chips," the pioneer sergeant (carpenter); "tank," wet canteen; +"tank-wallah," a drinker; "tanked," drunk; "A.T.A. wallah," a +teetotaller (from the Army Temperance Association); "on the cot" or "on +the tack," being teetotal; "jammy," lucky (and "jam," any sort of good +fortune); "win," to steal; "burgoo," porridge; "eye-wash," making things +outwardly presentable; "gone west," died (also applied to things broken, +_e.g._ a broken pipe has "gone west"); "oojah," anything (similar to +thingummy or what-d'ye-call-it); "push," "pusher," or "square push," a +girl (hence "square-push tunic," the "swagger" tunic for walking-out +occasions). The words for drunkenness are innumerable--"jingled," +"oiled," "tanked to the wide," "well sprung," "up the pole," "blotto," +etc.; but I smell the modern in some of these; their flavour is of +London taverns rather than of the dusty barrack squares of India, Egypt, +Malta, and Gibraltar. + +But who can delve to the ultimate springs of slang? A verb which I never +met before I enlisted was "to spruce." This is almost, if not quite, a +blend of "swinging the lead" and "doing a mike." To spruce is to dodge +duty or to deceive. A man who contrived to slip out of the ranks of a +squad when they were performing some distasteful task would be said to +"spruce off." Or he would be denounced as a "sprucer" if he managed to +arrive late for his meal and yet, by a trick, to secure a front place in +the waiting queue at the canteen. A word in constant employment, +"spruce"! It was new to me when I became an orderly, and for a long time +I thought that it was peculiar to our unit, in the same manner that the +jargon of certain boys is peculiar to certain schools. But I concluded +later that it might have a remote and roundabout origin in the old army +slang, "a spruce hand" at "brag"--the latter being a variant of the game +of poker, and a spruce hand, apparently, one which, held by a bluffer, +contained cards of no real value. + +Some day these etymological mysteries must be probed. Perhaps the German +professors, after the war, can usefully wreak themselves on this complex +and obscure research. Meanwhile the above notes are offered not as a +serious contribution to a subject so immense, but rather as a warning. +The infectiousness of slang is incredible; and this gigantic +inter-association of classes and clans has brought about a hitherto +unheard-of levelling-down of the common speech. Accent may or may not be +influenced: the vocabulary undoubtedly is. Nearly every home in the land +is soon going to be invaded by many forms of army slang: the process in +fact has already begun. If we were a sprightlier nation the effect might +not be all to the bad. But most of our slang-mongers are not wits. "He +was balmy a treat," I heard a soldier say of another soldier who had +shammed insane. That is what we are coming to: it is the tongue we +shall use and likewise (I fear) the condition in which some of us will +find ourselves as a result. + + + + +XV + +A BLIND MAN'S HOME-COMING + + +In my boyhood I had the ambition--it was one of several ambitions--to +become a courier. The _Morning Post_ advertisements of couriers who +professed to be fluent in a number of languages and were at the disposal +of invalid aristocrats desiring to take extensive (and expensive) trips +abroad, aroused the most romantic visions in my mind. A courier's was +the life for me. I saw myself whirling all over Europe--with my +distinguished invalid--in sleeping-cars de luxe. Anon we were crossing +the Atlantic or lolling in punkah-induced breezes on the verandahs of +Far Eastern hotels. It was a great profession, that of the experienced +and successful courier. + +I have never been a courier in quite this picturesque acceptation; and +yet, in a humbler sense, I have perhaps (to my own surprise) earned the +title. As an R.A.M.C. orderly I have more than once officiated as +travelling courier--yes, and to distinguished, if far from affluent, +invalids. They ought, at least, to rank as distinguished; for the reason +they needed a courier was because they had given their health, or limbs, +or eyesight, in defence of their country. + +It happens only too often that when a patient is discharged from +hospital he is not fit to make his journey home alone. An orderly is +detailed to accompany him. Sometimes the lot has fallen on me. Generally +the trip is a short one, to some outlying suburb of London or to some +town or village in the home counties; but sometimes my flights have been +further afield, to Ireland, or Wales; and once I went to Yorkshire with +a blind man. + +That Yorkshire expedition was singularly lacking in drama and in surface +pathos, yet its details remain with great clearness. The piece of +damaged goods which, being of no further fighting use, was being +returned with thanks to the hearthside from whence it came, was an +individual answering to the unheroic cognomen of Briggs. A +high-explosive shell had been sent by the Gods to alter the current of +Briggs's career. Briggs came through all that part of the war which +concerned him without a scratch upon his person--only after the arrival +in his immediate vicinity of the high-explosive shell he was +unfortunately unable to see. Never again would Briggs be of the +slightest value either as a soldier or in his civilian trade, which was +that of driver of ponies in a coal-mine. Consequently, as a +distinguished invalid (with the sum of one pound in his pocket to +comfort him until such time as his pension should materialise), +Mister--no longer Private--Briggs, for the first and presumably the last +time in his existence, went travelling with a courier. + +A car supplied by the National Motor Volunteer Service awaited Briggs +and his courier at the hospital entrance. Here the introduction between +Briggs and his courier took place. Ours is a large hospital, and I had +never to my knowledge encountered Briggs before that moment. I beheld a +young fellow (he was only twenty-three) with a stout, healthy visage +which wore a pleasant smile and would have been describable as roguish, +only ... well, the eyes of a blind man, whatever else they are, are not +conducive to a roguish mien. They were eyes not visibly damaged: nice +blue eyes. And they stared at nothingness. I was in the presence of a +stripling who, a few weeks ago, must have owned a mobile face, and was +in rapid process of developing a quite different face, a face which +still might--it certainly did--grin and laugh, but which would gradually +gain, had already begun to gain, a set expressionlessness that overlaid +and strangely neutralised its grins and its laughter. + +Blind men's faces may have beauty, even vivacity, or a heightened +intelligence and fire; but there is a something, hard to define, of +which they are sadly devoid. The windows of the soul are dimmed. The +face inevitably changes. And if even I, who knew not Briggs, could +perceive that Briggs's face must thus have changed, how much more +conspicuous would the change be to the partner whom Briggs had left +seven months before and to whom I was now leading him back--his wife. + +Briggs, a civilian once more, sported reach-me-down garments which +fitted him surprisingly--our Clothing Store sergeant is the kindest of +souls and expends infinite patience on doing his best, with +government-contract tailoring, to suit all our discharges. His overcoat, +which might have been called a Chesterfield in Shoreditch, pleased +Briggs, as he told me in the car: he drew my attention to its texture +and warmth, he admiringly fingered it. "I might ha' paid thirty bob for +that there top-coat," he surmised. "A collar an' a tie an' all, too! +Them boots ain't so dusty, neither: they fit me a treat. Goin' 'ome to +my missus in Sunday clobber, I am." You would have said that he thought +he had emerged from his hazards with rather a good bargain. A jumble of +ready-made clothes--and a pension! The visible world gone for ever! +These were his souvenirs of the great war. And, "Ah," he said, when I +ventured on some allusion to his blindness, "it might ha' bin worse. I +don' know what I'd ha' done if I'd lost a leg, same as some of them +other poor jossers in th' hospital!" + +(And this, marvellous though it sounds, is the standpoint of no small +number in the legion of our Briggses.) + +The motor ride was another source of gratification to Briggs. Seated +beside me, the wind beating on his sightless orbs, he discoursed of the +wonders of petrol. "Proper to take you about, them cars. W'ere are we +now? 'Ave we far to run, like?" I told him we were traversing Battersea +Park and that our destination was St. Pancras. It transpired that he was +a stranger to London. This drive through London was, as it were, an item +in his collection of experiences, to be preserved with the cross-channel +voyage and the vigils in the trenches. "Shall we go by Buckingham +Palace?" I told him we shouldn't; then, observing that he was +disappointed, I asked the driver to make the détour. So at last I was +able to inform Briggs that we were passing Buckingham Palace: I turned +his head so that he looked straight towards that architectural +phenomenon. It was, of course, invisible to him. No matter. He wished to +be able to boast, to his wife, that he had seen (he used that verb) the +house where the King lived. + +His wife--he married a month before he enlisted--had been notified of +his return; but I suggested that at St. Pancras we might telegraph to +her the actual hour of the train's arrival, in case she should desire to +meet it. The idea commended itself to Briggs: he had not thought of such +a thing: telegraphing had perhaps hardly come within his purview, at +least so I surmised when, the telegraph-form before me, I asked him what +he wished me to write. He began cheerily, as though dictating a letter +of gossip:--"_My dear wife_--" Economy necessitated a taboo of this +otherwise charming method of communication. "_Arriving Bradford +five-thirty, Tom_," was the result of final boilings-down, which took so +long that we nearly achieved the anticlimax of missing our train +altogether. + +Now at Bradford (at the end of one of the chattiest five hours I ever +spent in my life) no Mrs. Briggs was perceptible. I kept my patient on +the platform until every other passenger had gone: I marched him up and +down the main area of the station. Each time I caught sight of a woman +who looked a possible Mrs. Briggs I steered my charge into her vicinity. +In spite of a piece of information which Briggs had imparted to me on +the journey--namely, that he expected soon to become a father--I was +surprised that his wife had not come to the station to welcome him. +However, it was plain that Briggs himself was not particularly +surprised, nor, what was more important, disappointed. Nothing could +damp his eternal placidity and good humour. He proposed that from this +point onward he should pursue his journey alone. "Nowt to do but git on +th' tram," he said. "It's a fair step from 'ere, but I knows every inch +of t' way." At all events (as of course I could not allow this) he would +now act as my guide. And he did. "First to the right.... Now we're goin' +by a big watchmaker's-and-jeweller's.... Now cross t' street.... Now on +th' corner over there by t' Sinnemer is w'ere we git our tram." + +The tram in due course appeared, and we boarded it. "Tha mun pay +thrippence only, mind," he warned me when the conductor came round. +"It's a rare long ride for thrippence." So it proved to be--through +wildernesses which were half meadow and half slum, my cicerone at every +hundred yards pointing out the notable features of the landscape. On our +left I ought to see the so-and-so public house; on our right the +football ground--I should know it by the grand-stand jutting above the +palings; further on were brickworks; further still a factory which, my +nose would have told me, even if Mr. Briggs had not, dealt with +chemicals; then, on the skyline, a pit-head; then another; then a mining +village with three different kinds of methodist church and two picture +palaces; then a gap of dreary, dirty fields. And then, nearing dusk, the +village where my friend lived, and where also was the terminus of the +tram route. + +We quitted the tram and walked down a street of those squalid brick +tenements which coal-mining seems to germinate like a rash upon the +earth's surface. The debris and the scaffoldings of pits were dotted +about the adjacent countryside. Sooty cabbage-patches occupied the +occasional interspaces in the ranks of houses. Briggs directed me across +a cinder path in one of these cabbage-patches. "See them three 'ouses at +the bottom of the 'ill? The end one's mine." We approached. No sign of +the wife. Surely she would be on the look-out for her husband? Also +there was a sister and a brother-in-law--the latter in a prosperous way +of business as a grocer near-by: Briggs had told me of them. Would not +they be watching for him? I began to be anxious. Not once, but several +times, I had heard of the wounded soldier returning to his home and +finding no home: both home and wife had gone. (Those are bitterly tragic +tales, which a realist must write some day.) Still, as we came nearer, I +saw nobody at the cottage door. "Is th' door open?" asked Briggs. Yes, +it was open. When we were at the end of the cabbage-patch, and I could +discern the interior of the cottage parlour (into which the door opened +direct), it became clear that three persons were there. One of them, a +man, obviously the brother-in-law, came and peeped out of the window at +us, and turned and spoke to his companions. Of these two, both women, +one rose from her chair and the other remained seated. But none of the +three came to the door. + +I have met northern dourness and the inarticulate manner which is such a +contrast to the gushing and noisy effusion of the south. By a paradox it +is not inconsistent with the familiar conversationalism to which Briggs +had treated me, a stranger. But I admit I found Briggs's family circle a +little embarrassing. They were respectable people: the cottage was neat +and decently furnished, its occupants were sprucely dressed. I fancy +they were in their best clothes; certainly their demeanour--and the +aspect of the table in their midst--denoted a great occasion. This +table, as I saw when I assisted Briggs up the steps into the room, had +indeed borne a well-spread tea. No very acute powers of deduction were +required to decide, from the crumbs on the white cloth and on the +dishes, that there _had_ been bread and butter and jam and cake. Of +these not a vestige (except the crumbs) remained. Briggs and I were an +hour behindhand, and the relatives who awaited the wanderer had eaten +the banquet laid to welcome him: or so it appeared. I have no doubt that +all sorts of delicacies were in the cupboard; the kettle on the hob was +probably on the boil; perhaps buttered toast was in the oven. The fact +remains that devastation was on the table. + +However, Briggs did not see the table, and the table's state occupied me +only for a fraction of a second. I was more concerned with the three +people in the parlour and with their reception of my patient. The pale +woman in the chair by the fire was evidently Briggs's wife. She stared +at us, as we entered, but said absolutely nothing. Nor did the other and +slightly younger woman, his sister, say anything. She too stared. And +the man stared, and said nothing. + +"Well, here we are," I announced--an imbecile assertion, but I produced +it as cheerfully and matter-of-factly as I knew how. I unhooked my arm +from Briggs's, and made as though to push him forward into the family +group. + +"Nay!" said Briggs. "I mun take my top-coat off first." + +I helped him off with his coat. Not one of the three members of his +family had either moved or spoken--beyond one faint murmur, not an +actual word, in response to my "Here we are." But Briggs seemed to know +that his folk were in the room with him, and he neither accosted them, +expressed any curiosity about them, or betrayed any astonishment at +their silence. + +When he had got his coat off I expected him to move forward into the +room. A mistake. Mine must be a hasty temperament. They don't do things +like that in Yorkshire, not even when they have come home blinded from +the wars. Briggs put out his hand, felt for the cottage door, half +closed it, felt for a nail on the inner side of it, and carefully hung +his coat thereon. + +_Now_ I could usher him into the waiting family circle. + +No. I was wrong. + +Briggs calmly divested himself of his jacket. He then felt for another +door, a door which opened on to a stair leading to the upper storey. On +a nail in this door he hung his jacket. And then, in his shirt-sleeves, +he was ready. Shirt-sleeves were symbolical. He was home at last, and +prepared to sit down with his people. + +Of the actual reunion I saw nothing, for I promptly said I must go. It +was imperative for me to hurry back, or I should miss my train. + +"You'll stay an' take a sup of tea with us," said Briggs. + +I couldn't, though I should have liked to do so, in some ways, and in +others should have hardly dared to be an intruder on such a meeting. I +shook hands with my patient. Looking back as I went out of the door I +saw Briggs's wife still seated, motionless, in her chair. She had not +opened her lips. It was impossible to divine what were her emotions. She +was very pale. There were no tears in her eyes as she stared at her +young blind husband. But I think there were tears waiting to be shed. + +I looked back again when I reached the end of the path across the +cabbage-patch. The cottage door was still open. In the aperture stood +the younger of the two women, Briggs's sister. She waved to me and +smiled. It was evident that it had struck her that I ought to have been +thanked for my services, and she was expressing this, cordially if +belatedly. I waved my hand in return, and hastened up the street towards +the tram. + +My hurry was fruitless. I missed my train in Bradford, and stayed the +night at an hotel, thus (with appropriate but improper extravagance) +concluding this particular performance in the rôle of travelling courier +to a distinguished invalid. As I sat over a sumptuous table d'hôte--this +was long before the submarine blockade and the food restrictions--I +wondered what Briggs's wife said to Briggs; and I made up a story about +it. But what I have written above is not a story, it is the unadorned +truth, which I could not have invented and which is perhaps better than +the story. In his courier's presence Briggs addressed not one word to +his wife, and his wife addressed not one word to him; nor did his sister +or his brother-in-law. Nor did any of this trio address one word to me. + + +PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY HAZELL, WATSON AND VINEY, LD., LONDON AND +AYLESBURY, FOR SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT & CO., LTD. + + + + * * * * * + + + +Popular 1/-net Novels + + +"_'Arf a Mo', Pinky!_" + +Private Pinkerton, Millionaire + +By HAROLD ASHTON + +The rollicking adventures of Pte. Pinkerton, Millionaire, and his pal, +that irrepressible and courageous soldier, Pte. William Bailey--"Bill," +to his friends--ex-burglar, humorist, and all-round sportsman. + + +Phillip in Particular + +By W. DOUGLAS NEWTON + +(_Phillip, with two "l's" please, and said slowly._) Has delighted +thousands of our boys in the Army. + + +Gloria. 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By post 5s. 4d. + +"These stories of the great war make the great tragedy to pass clear and +vivid before the reader's eye. His purpose has been to make real to +those at home the endurance and the heroism of our soldiers, and in this +he has perfectly succeeded. We need books such as this to keep us awake +to the horrors of these days. For there is a danger of becoming +acclimatised even to the brutalities of war."--_Scotsman._ + + +Mud and Khaki + +By VERNON BARTLETT + +3s. 6d. net. By post 3s. 10d. + +"A very clever and enjoyable collection of sketches picturing the +character of the fighting men in the trenches, the tragedy and the +farce, the humour, and the elementary humanity that crudely jostle each +other in his life."--_Globe._ + +"There is much humour and some pathos, and always reality and the +splendid spirit of the British Soldier in them."--_Westminster Gazette._ + +"Sketches from Flanders and France. The humorous and pathetic are well +blended in these brightly written sketches."--_Glasgow Herald._ + +"Simply written, but the intensely human descriptions of the life of the +soldier compels attention."--_Everyman._ + + +Oh, Canada! + +A Budget of Stories and Pictures by Members of the Canadian +Expeditionary Force + +3s. net. By post 3s. 5d. + +_Send a copy to a friend in Canada._ + +"A lively and varied collection, with not a dull page."--_The Times._ + +"'Oh, Canada!' deserves a hearty welcome, not only for its patriotic +aims, but for its own intrinsic worth. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: Observations of an Orderly</p> +<p> Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital</p> +<p>Author: Ward Muir</p> +<p>Release Date: February 1, 2006 [eBook #17655]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OBSERVATIONS OF AN ORDERLY***</p> +<p> </p> +<h4>E-text prepared by Suzanne Lybarger, Irma Spehar,<br /> + and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br /> + (<a href="http://www.pgdp.net/">http://www.pgdp.net/</a>)<br /> + from page images generously made available by<br /> + Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries<br /> + (<a href="http://www.archive.org/details/toronto">http://www.archive.org/details/toronto</a>)</h4> +<p> </p> +<table border="0" style="background-color: #ccccff;" cellpadding="10"> + <tr> + <td valign="top"> + Note: + </td> + <td> + Images of the original pages are available through + Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries. See + <a href="http://www.archive.org/details/observationsorderly00muiruoft"> + http://www.archive.org/details/observationsorderly00muiruoft</a> + </td> + </tr> +</table> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span></p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span></p> + +<h1>OBSERVATIONS OF AN<br /> +ORDERLY</h1> + +<h3>SOME GLIMPSES OF LIFE AND WORK<br /> +IN AN ENGLISH WAR HOSPITAL</h3> + + +<h4>BY</h4> + +<h3><span class="smcap">L.-Cpl.</span> WARD MUIR, R.A.M.C. (T.)</h3> + +<p class='center'>SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON,<br /> +KENT & CO., LTD., 4 STATIONERS'<br /> +HALL COURT : : : LONDON, E.C.4<br /> +</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span></p> +<p class='center'><i>Copyright<br /> +First published July 1917</i><br /> +<br /></p> + +<div class='center'> +<table border="1" cellpadding="20" cellspacing="0" summary=""> +<tr><td align='center'><p><i>Novels by the Author of "Observations of an Orderly"</i></p> + + +THE AMAZING MUTES<br /> +WHEN WE ARE RICH<br /> +CUPID'S CATERERS<br /> + +<hr style="margin:1em; width:3em;" /> + +<i>Also Editor of</i><br /> + +"HAPPY—THOUGH WOUNDED"<br /> + +<small>The Book of the Third London General Hospital</small></td></tr> +</table></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span></p><p class='center'>TO</p> + +<p class='center'><span class="smcap">Lt.-Col.</span> H. E. BRUCE PORTER, C.M.G.</p> + +<p class='center'><span class="smcap">Officer in Command of the</span></p> + +<p class='center'><span class="smcap">3rd London</span></p> + +<p class='center'><span class="smcap">General Hospital</span></p> + +<blockquote><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span></p><p>Some passages from <i>Observations of an Orderly</i> have appeared, +generally in a shorter form, in <i>The Spectator</i>, <i>The New Statesman</i>, +<i>The Hospital</i>, <i>The Evening Standard</i>, <i>The National News</i>, <i>The Dundee +Advertiser</i>, <i>The Daily News</i>, and <i>The Daily Mail</i>. The author desires +to make the usual acknowledgments to their editors.</p> + +<p>The coloured design on the paper wrapper is by Sergeant Noël Irving, +R.A.M.C. (T.), a member of the unit at the 3rd London General Hospital.</p></blockquote> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS</h2> + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="Contents"> +<tr><td> </td><td align='left'><small>PAGE</small></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center'>I</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">My First Day</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_19">19</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">II</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Life in the Orderlies' Huts</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_33">33</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">III</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Washing-up</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_51">51</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">IV</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A "Hut" Hospital</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_65">65</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span>V</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">From the "D Block" Wards</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_79">79</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">VI</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">When the Wounded Arrive</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_93">93</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">VII</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>"<span class="smcap">T</span>.... <span class="smcap">A</span>...."</td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_107">107</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">VIII</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Laundry Problems</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_121">121</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">IX</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">On Buttons</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_137">137</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">X</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Word about "Slackers in Khaki"</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_147">147</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span>XI</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Recreation Rooms</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_159">159</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">XII</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Cockney</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_173">173</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">XIII</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Station Party</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_201">201</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">XIV</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Slang in a War Hospital</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_219">219</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center' style="padding-top: 1em;">XV</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Blind Man's Home-coming</span></td><td align='center'><a href="#Page_235">235</a></td></tr> +</table></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="I" id="I"></a>I</h2> + +<h2>MY FIRST DAY</h2> + + +<p>The sergeant in charge of the clothing store was curt. He couldn't help +it: he had run short of tunics, also of "pants"—except three pairs +which wouldn't fit me, wouldn't fit anybody, unless we enlisted three +very fat dwarfs: he had kept on asking for tunics and pants, and they'd +sent him nothing but great-coats and water-bottles: I could take his +word for it, he wished he was at the Front, he did, instead of in this +blessed hole filling in blessed forms for blessed clothes which never +came. Impossible, anyhow, to rig me out. I was going on duty, was I? +Then I must go on duty in my "civvies."</p> + +<p>It was a disappointment. Your new recruit feels that no small item of +his reward is the privilege of beholding himself in <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span>khaki. The escape +from civilian clothes was, at that era, one of the prime lures to +enlistment. I had attempted to escape before, and failed. Now at last I +had found a branch of the army which would accept me. It needed my +services instantly. I was to start work at once. Nothing better. I was +ready. This was what I had been seeking for months past. But—I confess +it—I had always pictured myself dressed as a soldier. The postponement +of this bright vision for even twenty-four hours, now that it had seemed +to be within my grasp, was damping. However—! The Sergeant-Major had +told me that I was to go on duty as orderly in Ward W—an officers' +ward—at 2 p.m. prompt. I did not know where Ward W was; I did not know +what a ward-orderly's functions should amount to. And I had no uniform. +I was attired in a light grey lounge suit—appropriate enough to my +normal habit, but quite too flippant, I was certain, for a ward-orderly. +Whatever else a ward-orderly might be, I was sure that he was not the +sort of person to sport a grey lounge suit.</p> + +<p>Still, I must hie me to Ward W. I had <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span>got my wish. I was in the army at +last. In the army one does not argue. One obeys. So, having been +directed down an interminable corridor, I presented myself at Ward W.</p> + +<p>On entering—I had knocked, but no response rewarded this courtesy—I +was requested, by a stern-visaged Sister, to state my business. Her +sternness was excusable. The visiting-hour was not yet, and in my +unprofessional guise she had taken me for a visitor. My explanation +dispelled her frowns. She was expecting me. Her present orderly had been +granted three days' leave. He was preparing to depart. I was to act as +his substitute. Before he went he would initiate me into the secrets of +his craft. She called him. "Private Wood!" Private Wood, in his +shirt-sleeves, appeared. I was handed over to him.</p> + +<p>Herein I was fortunate, though I was unaware of it at the time. Private +Wood, who was not too proud to wash dishes (which was what he had at +that moment been doing), is a distinguished sculptor and a man of keen +imagination. At a subsequent period that imagination was to bring forth +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span>the masks-for-facial-disfigurements scheme which gained him his +commission and which has attracted world-wide notice from experts. +Meanwhile his imagination enabled him to understand the exact extent of +a novice's ignorance, the precise details which I did not know and must +know, the essential apparatus I had to be shown the knack of, before he +fled to catch his train.</p> + +<p>He devoted just five minutes, no more, to teaching me how to be a +ward-orderly. Four of those minutes were lavished on the sink-room—a +small apartment that enshrines cleaning appliances, the taps of which, +if you turn them on without precautions, treat you to an involuntary +shower bath. The sink-room contains a selection of utensils wherewith +every orderly becomes only too familiar: their correct employment, a +theme of many of the mildly Rabelaisian jests which are current in every +hospital, is a mystery—until some kind mentor, like Private Wood, lifts +the veil. In four minutes he had told me all about the sink-room, and +all about all the gear in the sink-room and all about a variety of +rituals which need not here be dwelt on.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> (The sink-room is an excellent +place in which to receive a private lecture.) The fifth minute was spent +in introducing me, in another room, the ward kitchen, to Mrs. +Mappin—the scrub-lady.</p> + +<p>A scrub-lady is attached to each ward; and most wards, it should in +justice be added, are attached to their scrub-ladies. Certainly I was to +find that Ward W was attached to Mrs. Mappin. Mrs. Mappin was washing +up. Private Wood had been helping her. The completion of his task he +delegated to me. "Mrs. Mappin, this is our new orderly. He'll help you +finish the lunch-dishes." Private Wood then slid into his tunic, +snatched his cap from a nail in the wall, and vanished.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Mappin surveyed me. "Ah!" she sighed—she was given to sighing. +"He's a good 'un, is Private Wood." The inference was plain. There was +little hope of my becoming such a good 'un. In any case, my natty grey +tweeds were against me. One could never make an orderliesque impression +in those tweeds. "Better take your jacket off," sighed Mrs. Mappin. I +did so, chose a dishcloth, and started to dry a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>pyramid of wet plates. +For a space Mrs. Mappin meditated, her hands in soapy water. Then she +withdrew them. "I think," she sighed, "you an' me could do with a cup of +tea."</p> + +<p>And presently I was having tea with Mrs. Mappin.</p> + +<p>I was afterwards to learn that this practice of calling a halt in her +labours for a cup of tea was a highly incorrect one on Mrs. Mappin's +part, and that my share in the transaction was to the last degree +reprehensible. But I was also to learn that faithful, selfless, honest, +and diligent scrub-ladies are none too common; and the Sister who +discovers that she has been allotted such a jewel as Mrs. Mappin is +seldom foolish enough to exact from her a strict obedience to the letter +of the law in discipline. Mrs. Mappin, in her non-tea-bibbing +interludes, toiled like a galley-slave, was rigidly punctual, and never +complained. Her sighs were no index of her character. They were not a +symptom of ennui (though possibly—if the suggestion be not rude—of +indigestion caused by tannin poisoning). She was the best-tem<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span>pered of +creatures. It is a fact that if I had been so disposed I need never have +given Mrs. Mappin any assistance, though it was within my province to do +so. She would, without a murmur, shoulder other people's jobs as well as +her own. Having finished with bearing children (one was at the Front—it +was Mrs. Mappin who, on being asked the whereabouts of her soldier son, +said, "'E's in France; I don't rightly know w'ere the place is, but it's +<i>called</i> 'Dugout'"), she had settled down, for the remainder of her +sojourn on this plane, to a prospect of work, continuous work. A little +more or a little less made no difference to her. She had nothing else to +do, but work; nothing else to be interested in, except work—and her +children's progress, and her cups of tea. Her ample figure concealed a +warm heart. Behind her wrinkled old face there was a brain with a +limited outfit of ideas—and the chief of those ideas was <i>work</i>.</p> + +<p>Our cup of tea was refreshing, but it would be incorrect to convey the +notion that I was allowed to linger over such a luxury. There are few +intervals for leisure in the duty-hours of an orderly in an officers'<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> +ward. Had the Sister and her nurses not been occupied elsewhere, I doubt +whether I should have been free to drink that cup of tea at all—a +circumstance of which perhaps Mrs. Mappin was more aware than I. At any +rate the call of "Orderly!" from a patient summoned me from the kitchen +and into the ward long before I had finished drying Mrs. Mappin's +dishes.</p> + +<p>The patient desired some small service performed for him. I performed +it—remembering to address him as "Sir." Various other patients, +observing my presence, took the opportunity to hail me. I found myself +saying "Yes, Sir!" "In a moment, Sir!" and dropping—with a promptitude +on which I rather flattered myself—into the manner of a cross between a +valet and a waiter, with a subtle dash of chambermaid. Soon I was also a +luggage-porter, staggering to a taxi with the ponderous impedimenta of a +juvenile second lieutenant who was bidding the hospital farewell, and +whose trunks contained—at a guess—geological specimens and battlefield +souvenirs in the shape of "dud" German shells. This young gentleman +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>fumbled with a gratuity, then thought better of it—and was gracious +enough to return my grin. "Bit awkward, tipping, in these days," he +apologised cheerily, depositing himself in his taxi behind ramparts of +holdalls. "Thank you, Sir," seemed the suitable adieu, and having +proffered it I scampered into the ward again. Anon Sister sent me with a +message to the dispensary. Where the dispensary was I knew not. But I +found out, and brought back what she required. Then to the post office. +Another exploration down that terrific corridor. Post office located at +last and duly noted. Then to the linen store to draw attention to an +error in the morning's supply of towels. Linen store eventually +unearthed—likewise the information that its staff disclaimed all +responsibility for mistakes—likewise the first inkling of a profound +maxim, that when a mistake has been made, in hospital, it is always the +orderly, and no one else, who has made it.</p> + +<p>Engaged on these errands, and a host of intervening lesser exploits in +the ward, I had to cultivate an unwonted fleetness of foot. I flew. So +did the time. Almost <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span>immediately, as it seemed to me, I was bidden to +serve afternoon tea to our patients. The distribution of bed-tables, of +cups, of bread-and-butter (most of which, also, I cut); the "A little +more tea, Sir?" or, "A pot of jam in your locker, Sir, behind the pair +of trousers?... Yes, here it is, Sir"; the laborious feeding of a +patient who could not move his arms;—all these occupied me for a +breathless hour. Then an involved struggle with a patient who had to be +lifted from a bath-chair into bed. (I had never lifted a human being +before.) Then a second bout of washing-up with Mrs. Mappin. Then a +nominal half-an-hour's respite for my own tea—actually ten minutes, for +I was behindhand. Then, all too soon, more waitering at the ceremony of +Dinner: this time with the complication that some of my patients were +allowed wine, beer, or spirits, and some were not. "Burgundy, Sir?" +"Whiskey-and-soda, Sir?" I ran round the table of the sitting-up +patients, displaying (I was pleased to think) the complete aplomb and +nimbleness of a thoroughbred Swiss <i>garçon</i>, pouring out drinks—with +concealed envy—placing and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span>removing plates, handing salt, bread, +serviettes.... After which, back to Mrs. Mappin and her renewed mountain +of once-more-to-be-washed-and-dried crockery.</p> + +<p>It was long after my own supper hour had come and gone that I was able +to say au revoir to the ward. The cleansing of the grease-encrusted +meat-tin was a travail which alone promised to last half the night. +(Mrs. Mappin eventually lent me her assistance, and later I became more +adroit.) And the calls of "Orderly!" from the bed patients were +interruptions I could not ignore. But at last some sort of conclusion +was reached. Mrs. Mappin put on her bonnet. The night orderly, who was +to relieve me, was overdue. Sister, discovering me still in the kitchen, +informed me that I might leave.</p> + +<p>"You ain't 'ad any supper, 'ave you?" said Mrs. Mappin. "You won't get +none now, neither. Should 'ave done a bunk a full hower back, you +should."</p> + +<p>She drew me into the larder, and indicated the debris of our patients' +repast. "A leg of chicken and some rice pudden. Only wasted if <i>you</i> +don't 'ave it."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span></p><p>"But is it allowed—?" I was, in truth, not only tired but ravenous.</p> + +<p>Sister, entering upon this conspiratorial dialogue, unhesitatingly gave +her approval.</p> + +<p>Cold rice pudding and a left-over leg of chicken, eaten standing, at a +shelf in a larder, can taste very good indeed, even to the wearer of a +spick-and-span grey lounge suit. I shall know in future what it means +when my restaurant waiter emerges from behind the screened service-door +furtively wiping his mouth. I sympathise. I too have wolfed the choice +morsels from the banquet of my betters.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2> + +<h2>LIFE IN THE ORDERLIES' HUTS</h2> + + +<p>In May, 1915, when I enlisted, the weather was beautiful. Consequently +the row of tin huts, to which I was introduced as my future address "for +the duration," wore an attractive appearance. The sun shone upon their +metallic sides and roofs. The shimmering foliage of tall trees, and a +fine field of grass, which made a background to the huts, were fresh and +green and restful to the eye. Even the foreground of hard-trodden +earth—the barrack square—was dry and clean, betraying no hint of its +quagmire propensities under rain. Later on, when winter came, the +cluster of huts could look dismal, especially before dawn on a wet +morning, when the bugle sounding parade had dragged us from warm beds; +or in an afternoon thaw after snow, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span>when the corrugated eaves wept +torrents in the twilight, and one's feet (despite the excellence of army +boots) were chilled by their wadings through slush. Meanwhile, however, +the new recruit had nothing to complain of in the aspect of the housing +accommodation which was offered him. Merely for amusement's sake he had +often "roughed it" in quarters far less comfortable than these bare but +well-built huts—which even proved, on investigation, to contain beds: +an unexpected luxury.</p> + +<p>"I'll put you in Hut 6," said the Sergeant-Major. "There's one empty +bed. It's the hut at the end of the line."</p> + +<p>Thereafter Hut 6 was my home—and I hope I may never have a less +pleasant one or less good company for room-mates. In these latter I was +perhaps peculiarly fortunate. But that is by the way. It suffices that +twenty men, not one of whom I had ever seen before, welcomed a total +stranger, and both at that moment and in the long months which were to +elapse before various rearrangements began to scatter us, proved the +warmest of friends.</p> + +<p>Twenty-one of us shared our downsittings <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>and our uprisings in Hut 6. +There might have been an even number, twenty-two, but one bed's place +was monopolised by a stove (which in winter consumed coke, and in summer +was the repository of old newspapers and orange-peel). The hut, +accordingly, presented a vista of twenty-one beds, eleven along one wall +and ten along the other, the stove and its pipe being the sole +interruption of the symmetrical perspective. Above the beds ran a +continuous shelf, bearing the hut-inhabitants' equipment, or at least +that portion of it—great-coat, water-bottle, mess-tin, etc.—not +continually in use. Below each bed its owner's box and his boots were +disposed with rigid precision at an exact distance from the box and +boots beneath the adjacent bed. In the ceiling hung two electric lights. +These, with the stove, beds, shelves, boxes and boots, constituted the +entire furniture of the hut—unless you count an alarm-clock, bought by +public subscription, and notable for a trick of tinkling faintly, as +though wanting to strike but failing, in the watches of the night, hours +before its appointed minute <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span>had arrived. The hut contained no other +furniture whatever, and in those days did not seem to us to require any. +In the autumn, when the daylight shortened and we could no longer hold +our parliaments on a bench outside, a couple of deck-chairs were +mysteriously imported; and, as the authorities remained unshocked, a +small table also appeared and was squeezed into a gap beside the stove. +Some sybarite even goaded us into getting up a fund for a strip of +linoleum to be laid in the aisle between the beds. This was done—I do +not know why, for personally I have no objection to bare boards. I +suppose linoleum is easier to keep clean than wood; and that aisle, +tramped on incessantly by hobnail boots which in damp weather were, as +to their soles and heels, mere bulbous trophies of the alluvial deposits +of the neighbourhood, was sometimes far from speckless. But to me the +strip of linoleum made our hut look remotely like a real room in a real +house: it was a touch of the conventional which I never cared for, and I +only subscribed to it when I had voted against it and been overborne. An +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span>extraordinary proposition, that we should inaugurate a plant in a pot +on the stove's lid in summer, was, I am glad to say, negatived. It would +have been the thin end of the wedge ... we might have arrived at +Japanese fans and photograph-frames on the walls.</p> + +<p>Not that our Company Officer would have tolerated any nonsense of that +kind. Punctually at eight-thirty, after the second parade of the day, he +marched through each hut, inspecting it and calling the attention of the +Sergeant-Major to any detail which offended his sense of fitness. On wet +mornings, instead of parading outside, each man stood to his cot, and +thus the comments of the Company Officer, as he went down the aisle, +were audible to all. Stiffly drawn up to attention, we wondered +anxiously whether he would notice anything wrong with our buttons, boots +or belts, or whether he would "spot" the books and jam jars hidden +behind our overcoats on the shelves. Nothing so decadent and civilian as +a book—and certainly nothing so unsightly as a jam jar—must be visible +on your barrack-room <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>shelf. It is sacred to equipment, and particularly +to the folded great-coat.</p> + +<p>"The Art of Folding" might have been the title of the first lesson of +the many so good-naturedly imparted to me by my new comrades. There was, +I learnt, a right way and a wrong way to fold all things foldable. The +great-coat, for instance, must at the finish of its foldings, when it is +placed upon the exactly middle spot above your bed's end, present to the +eye of the beholder a kind of flat-topped pyramid whose waist-line (if a +pyramid can be said to own a waist) is marked by the belt with the three +polished buttons peeping through. The belt must bulge neither to the +right nor to the left; the pyramidal edifice of great-coat must not +loll—it must sit up prim and firm. And unless all your foldings of the +great-coat, from first to last, have, been deftly precise, no pyramid +will reward you, but a flabby trapezium: the belt will sag, its buttons +won't come centrally, and indeed the whole edifice of unwieldy cloth +will topple off its perch on the narrow shelf—which was designed to +refuse all lodgment for the property of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span>persons who had unsound ideas +on the subject of compact storage.</p> + +<p>The second series of folderies to which the novice was initiated +concerned themselves with his bedding. This consisted of a mattress, +three blankets and a pillow. It is an outfit at which no one need turn +up his nose. I never spent a bad night in army blankets, though when out +on leave I am sometimes a victim of insomnia between clean cold sheets. +But the moment the Réveillé uplifted you from your couch, that couch had +to be made ship-shape according to rule. No finicky "airing"! The +mattress must be rolled up, with the pillow as its core, and placed at +the end of the bed. On top of it a blanket, folded longwise and with the +ends hanging down, was laid neatly; on top of <i>that</i> you put the other +two blankets, folded quite otherwise; then you brought the first +blanket's ends over, and reversed the resultant bundle and pressed it +down into a thin stratified parallelogram with oval ends. The strata of +the said parallelogram, viewed from the aisle, must show no blanket +<i>edges</i>, only curves of the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span>blankets' folds: the edges (if visible at +all) must face inwards, not outwards. Correct folding, to be sure, gave +no visible edges, viewed from either side; and, once you caught the +knack, correct folding was just as easy as incorrect—though there were +temperaments which did not find it so and which rebelled against these +niceties.</p> + +<p>I was afterwards to learn that this mania for matching (if mania be +indeed a legitimate word for a custom based on common-sense principles +and seldom carried to the extremes which the recruit has been led to +fear) obtains not only in the army but also in the nursing profession. +Not long after I became a ward orderly I got a wigging from my "Sister" +because I had not noticed that every pillow-case of a ward's beds must +face towards the same point of the compass: the pillows on the vista of +beds must be placed in such a manner that the pillow-case mouths are, +all of them, turned away from anyone entering the ward's door. Similarly +the overlap of the counterpanes must all be of exactly the same depth +and caught up at exactly the same angle, the resulting <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span>series of pairs +of triangles all ending at exactly the same spot in each bedstead. These +trifles reveal at a glance the professional touch in a ward, and are, I +understand, not by any means the insignia of a military as distinct from +a civilian hospital. They may or may not contribute to the comfort of +the patient, but they betoken the captaincy of one whose methodicalness +will in other and less visible respects most emphatically benefit him.</p> + +<p>Our hut life was something more than a mere folding-up of bedding on +bedsteads and great-coats on shelves. After midday dinner it was +allowable to unroll the mattress, make the bed, and rest thereon—which +most of us by that time (having been on the run since 6 o'clock parade) +were very ready to do. There was half an hour to spare before 2 o'clock +parade, and a precious half-hour it was. Snores rose from some of the +beds where students of the war had collapsed beneath the newspapers +which they had meant to read. Desultory conversation enlivened those +corners where the denizens of the hut were <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span>energetic enough to polish +their boots or sew on buttons. The one or two men who happened to be +"going out on pass"—we were allowed one afternoon per week—were +putting on their puttees and brushing-up the metal buttons of their +walking-out tunics (otherwise known as their Square Push Suits). The +buttons of their working tunics had of course been burnished before +parade. The correct employment of button-sticks and of the magic cleaner +called Soldier's Friend; the polishing of one's out-of-use boots and +their placing, on the floor, with tied laces, and with their toes in +line with the bed's legs; the substitution of lost braces' buttons by +"bulldogs"; the furbishing of one's belt; the propping-up of the front +of one's cap with wads of paper in the interior of the crown; the +devices whereby non-spiral puttees can be coaxed into a resemblance of +spiral ones and caused to ascend in corkscrews above trousers which +refuse to tuck unlumpily into one's socks—these, and a host of other +matters, always kept a proportion of the hut-dwellers awake and busy and +loquacious even in the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>somnolent post-prandial half-hour before 2 +o'clock.</p> + +<p>But it was at night, at bedtime, that the hut became generally sociable. +Lights-Out sounded at 10.15; and at 10.10 we were all scrambling into +our pyjamas. In winter our disrobing was hasty; in summer it was an +affair of leisure, and deshabille roamings to and fro in the aisle, and +gossip. When the bugle blew and the electric lights suddenly ceased to +glow, leaving the hut in a darkness broken only by the dim shapes of the +windows and the red of cigarette-ends, many of us still had to complete +our undressing. We became adepts at doing this in the dark and so +disposing of the articles of our attire that they could be instantly +retrieved in the morning. Once between the blankets, conversation at +first waxed rather than waned. The Night Wardmaster, whose duty it was +to make the round of the orderlies' huts, disapproved of conversation +after Lights-Out, and was apt to say so, loudly and menacingly, when he +surprised us by popping his head in at the door. But—well—the Night<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> +Wardmaster always departed in the long run.... And then uprose, between +bed and bed, those unconclusive debates in which the masculine soul +delighteth: Theology; Woman; Victuals; Politics; Art; the Press; Sport; +Marriage; Money—and sometimes even The War; likewise the purely local +topics of Sisters and their Absurdities; Our Officers; The Other Huts; +What the Sergeant-Major Said; Why V.A.D.'s can't replace Male Orderlies; +What this Morning's Operations Looked Like; Whether an Officers' Ward or +a Men's Ward is the nicer; Who Deserves Stripes; C.O.'s Parade and its +Terrors; Advantages of Volunteering for Night Duty; The Cushy Job of +being in charge of a Sham Lunacy Case; Other Cushy Jobs less cushy than +They Sounded; and so forth; until at last protests began to be voiced by +the wearier folk who wanted silence.</p> + +<p>Silence it was, except for the thunder of occasional passing trains in +the near-by railway cutting. These had little power to disturb. Tucked +in the brown army blankets, which at first sight look so hard <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span>and so +prickly, we slumbered, the twenty-one of us, as one man; until, with a +cruel jolt, at 5.15 that wretched alarm-clock crashed forth its summons +for the fastidious few who liked to rise in ample time to bath and shave +before early parade. Sometimes I was of that virtuous band, and +sometimes I wasn't; but, either way, I hated the alarm-clock at +5.15,—though not so virulently as did those members of the hut who +never by any chance dreamt of rising until five to six. These gentry had +reduced the ritual of dressing, and of rolling up their bedding, to a +speed at which it might almost be compared to expert juggling: the +quickness of the hand deceived the eye. At five minutes to six you would +see the juggler asleep on his pillow, in blissful innocence; at six he +would be on parade, as correctly attired as you were yourself, and +having left behind him, in the hut, a bed as neatly folded as yours. The +world is sprinkled with people who can do this kind of thing—and our +hut was blessed with its due leaven of them. But I would not assert that +they <i>never</i> had to put some finish<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span>ing touches, either to their dress +or to their hut equipment foldings, before the Company Officer's tour of +inspection at 8.30. It sufficed that they would pass muster at 6 +o'clock, when appearances are less minutely important. And the man who +never rises till 5.55 detests an alarm-clock that whirrs at 5.15. The +hour at which the alarm-clock should be set to detonate was one of our +few acrimonious subjects of argument: I have even known it upset a +discussion on Woman. But the early risers had their way, and the clock +continued to be set for half an hour in front of Réveillé.</p> + +<p>The harsh vibration of the alarm at one end of the day, and the expiry +of the Lights-Out talks at the other—these events marked the chief +time-divisions in our hut life. While we were absent at work, our +interests were many and scattered; but the hut was a nucleus for +communal bonds of union which evoked no little loyalty and affection +from us all. On the May morning when I first beheld that corrugated-iron +abode I thought it looked inviting enough; but I did not guess how <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span>fond +I was to grow of its barn-like interior and of the sportive crew who +shared its mathematically-allotted floor-space. "Next war," one optimist +suggested during a typical Lights-Out séance, "let's all enlist together +again." There were protests against the implied prophecy, but none +against the proposition as such. That is the spirit of hut comradeship +... a spirit which no alarm-clock controversies can do aught to impair; +for though 5.15 a.m. is an hour to test the temper of a troop of +twenty-one saints, 10.15 p.m. will bring geniality and garrulousness to +twenty-one sinners.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2> + +<h2>WASHING-UP</h2> + + +<p>The following substances (to which I had previously been almost a +stranger) absorbed much of my interest during my first months as a +hospital orderly:</p> + +<p>Coagulated pudding, mutton fat and beef fat, cold gravy, treacle, +congealed cocoa, suet duff, skins of once hot milk:</p> + +<p>Plates, cups, frying-pans and other utensils smeared with the above:</p> + +<p>Knives, forks and spoons, ditto.</p> + +<p>I am fated to go through life, in the future, not merely with an exalted +opinion of scullery-maids—this I should not regret—but also with an +only too clear picture, when at the dinner table, of the adventures of +each dish of broken meats on its exit from view. I have been behind the +scenes at the business of eating, or rather, at the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span>dreadful repairs +which must be instituted when the business of eating is concluded in +order that the business of eating may recommence.</p> + +<p>There were days when the ward-kitchen was to me a battlefield and I +seemed to be fighting on the losing side. This was when our scrub-lady +was ill or had "got the sack" and it fell to me, the orderly, to do the +washing-up single-handed. Those patients who were well enough to be on +their feet were supposed to help. (I speak of a men's ward, of course, +not an officers'.) They did help, and that right willingly. Sometimes I +was blessed by the presence of a patient with a passion for cleaning +things. When there were no dishes to clean he would clean taps. When the +taps shone like gold he would clean the hooks on the dresser. When all +our kitchen gear was clean he would invade, with a kind of fury, the +sink-room and clean the apparatus there. When this was done he would +clean the ward's windows and door handles. Between-times he would clean +his boots and shave patients in bed. The new army is <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span>thickly sown with +men like that. They are the salt of the earth. I would place them at the +summit of the commonwealth's salary list, the bank clerk second, and the +business man, the artist and the politician at the bottom. At all events +these were my sentiments when a patient of this type, convalescing, +began to be able to help me with my kitchen chores. But it occasionally +chanced that every single patient in the ward was confined to bed. It +was then that I made my most intimate acquaintance with the catalogue of +horrors I have cited.</p> + +<p>You behold me, with my shirt-sleeves rolled up, faced by a heap of +twenty plates, twenty forks, twenty knives and twenty spoons, all +urgently requiring washing. Were these my whole task I should not +shrink. They would be nicely polished-off long ere one-fifteen +arrived—the time when I should (but probably shall not be able to) +leave for my own meal in the orderlies' mess. But there are two far more +serious opponents waiting to be subdued—the dinner-tin and the +pudding-basin. This pair are hateful beyond <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>words. Their memory will +for ever haunt me, a spectral disillusionment to spoil the relish of +every repast I may consume in the years that are ahead.</p> + +<p>The dinner-tin was a rectangular box some three feet long, twenty inches +wide and six inches deep. It was made of solid metal, was fitted with a +false bottom to contain hot water, and was divided internally into three +compartments to hold meat, vegetables and duff. These viands were loaded +into the tin at the hospital's central kitchen. I had naught to do with +the cookery—which I may mention always seemed to me to be excellent. My +sole concern was with the helping-out of the food to the patients and +the restoration of the dinner-tin to its shelf in the central kitchen. +For unless I restored that tin in a faultless state of cleanliness, the +sergeant in charge of the central kitchen would require my blood. The +tin's number would betray me. The sergeant needed not to know my name: +all he had to do, on discovering the questionable tin, was to glance at +its number and then send for <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span>the orderly of the ward with a +corresponding number.</p> + +<p>He was a sergeant whose aspect could be very daunting. I never had to +come before him on the subject of a dirty dinner-tin. But he and I had +some small passages concerning "specials" (separate diets ordered for +patients requiring delicacies). Sometimes the necessary forms for the +specials had been incorrectly made out by a Sister with no head for army +accuracy in minor clerical details. Thereafter it was my unlucky place +to see the sergeant, and put the matter straight with him. I have +survived those encounters. I have survived them with an enhanced respect +for the sergeant and the organisation of his large and by no means +simple department. There were moments, nevertheless, when I approached +his presence with a sinking heart. For if I failed to "get round" him in +the matter of coaxing another special for a patient, there was Sister to +placate on my return to the ward; and it was quite impossible to +persuade Sister that she could have made a mistake with her diet sheets, +or, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span>if she had, that it was of any consequence.</p> + +<p>The dinner-tin was somewhat larger than the sink in which I was supposed +to wash it. It was also very heavy. When full of food, and its false +bottom charged with hot water, I could only just lift it, and my +progress down the ward, carrying it from the trolley in the corridor to +the ward-kitchen, was a perilous and perspiring shuffle. As soon as all +the patients had been served I placed any left-over slices of meat in +the larder: these would be eaten at tea. Then I drained out the hot +water from the false bottom. Then (but only after experience had given +me wisdom) I ran hot water from the geyser tap into the now empty meat, +vegetable and duff compartments, and gave them a hurried swill: this to +rid them of the pestilent dregs of fatty material which would otherwise +have dried and glued themselves to the floor of the tin. The latter had +now to be put on one side, for I must be back in the ward attending to +my diners. Only when they had finished their meal, and their bed-tables +had been <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span>removed, folded up and placed neatly behind each bed, could I +tackle the tin in earnest.</p> + +<p>I abhor dabbling in grease; but life is full of abhorrent dilemmas which +must be endured; and the interior of that dinner-tin somehow got itself +cleaned, every day, in the long run. During the early part of any given +week I was almost happy over the job. For Monday was "Dry Store" day. On +Monday, and on Monday only—and you were helpless for the remainder of +the week if you forgot the rule—you could obtain, on presentation of a +chit, blacklead for the stoves, metal-polish for the brass, rags for +cleaning the floor, floor-polish, one box of matches, bath-brick, soft +soap, and—soda. It is an extraordinary chemical, soda. Before I became +a ward orderly I had no idea of the remarkable properties of soda. A +handful of soda in boiling water, and behold the grease dissolve meekly +from the nastiest dinner-tin! It was miraculous. When a pitying +scrub-lady first showed me the trick I thought that all my troubles were +at an end. Soda made the ward-kitchen seem like heaven.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> Alas, the +supply of soda considered sufficient by the Dry Store authorities never +lasted beyond Wednesday. On Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday the +dinner-tin had to be cleaned out not by alkaline agency, but by sheer +slogging hard labour. And when at last I stood it on edge to dry, and +thought to go off duty with a clear conscience, I generally found that I +had overlooked the waiting pudding-basin.</p> + +<p>On the whole I am inclined to pronounce the pudding-basin a more +obdurate utensil than even the dinner-tin. The pudding-basin, however, +only appeared every second morning. On duff days (duff being served in +the same tin as the meat and vegetables, though in a separate +compartment) we had no pudding. By pudding I mean milk pudding—rice or +sago or tapioca. Now a milk pudding, such as those my patients received, +though perhaps it was looked askance at in the nursery, is food which, +as an adult, I am far from despising. Rice pudding I have come with +maturer years to regard as a delicacy. Sago and tapioca I still eat +rather with amiable resignation <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span>than from choice. But any milk pudding, +as I now know, has a most vicious habit of cleaving to the dish in which +it was cooked. Rice is the least evil offender. The others are +absolutely wicked. To clean oleaginous scum from a dinner-tin is not +easy, but it is a mere bagatelle compared with cleaning the scorched +high-tide-mark of tapioca or sago from the shores of a large metal +pudding-basin. I have tried scraping with a knife blade, I have tried +every reasonable form of friction, and I can simply state as a fact from +my own personal experience (perhaps I am unfortunate) that those metal +pudding-basins of ours would frequently yield to nothing less powerful +than sandpaper.</p> + +<p>I need scarcely say that sandpaper was not supplied by the deities of +the Dry Store. Sandpaper did not come within their purview. It had no +recognised use in hospital. Therefore it did not exist. But, observing +that a succession of metal pudding-basins would be an insupportable +prospect without sandpaper, I laid in a stock of sandpaper, paying for +the same out <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span>of my own private purse. It was a cheap investment. Never +have earnings of mine been better spent. Moreover, having once hit on +the notion of giving myself a lift illegitimately, so to speak, I added +to the smuggling-in of sandpaper a secret purchase of soda. Except that +our scrub-ladies, each and all, discovering that the Dry Store's +allowance of this priceless chemical had at last apparently been +generous, caused it to fly at a disconcerting pace, and as a result +sometimes left me short of it, my career as a washer-up afterwards +became more comfortable.</p> + +<p>I shall never like washing-up. In the communal households of the future +I shall heave coal, sift cinders, dig potatoes, dust furniture or scour +floors—any task will be mine which, though it makes me dirty, does not +make me greasily dirty. But if I must wash-up, if I must study the +idiosyncrasies of cold fat, treacly plates, frying-pans which have +sizzled dripping-toast on the gas-ring, frozen gravy, and pudding-basins +with burnt milk-skins filmed to their sides, I shall be comparatively +un<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span>dismayed. For sandpaper is not yet (like the news posters) abolished; +and soda—although I hear its price has risen several hundred per +cent.—is still cheaper than, say, diamonds.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2> + +<h2>A "HUT" HOSPITAL</h2> + + +<p>People have curious ideas of the kind of building which would make a +good war hospital. "The So-and-So Club in Pall Mall," I have been told, +"should have been commandeered long ago. Ideal for hospital purposes. Of +course some of the M.P. members brought influence to bear, and the War +Office was choked off...." And so forth.</p> + +<p>It would surprise me to hear of anything that the War Office was held +back from doing if it wanted to do it. Perhaps the least likely +obstructionist to be successful in this project would be a +club-frequenting M.P. The War Office has taken exactly and precisely +what it chose—even when it would have been better to choose otherwise. +In this matter of commandeering buildings <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span>for hospitals it may or may +not have acted with wisdom; but at least it has been safe in avoiding +the advice of the individual who jumps to the conclusion that just any +pleasingly-situated edifice will do, provided beds and nurses are +shovelled into it in sufficient quantities.</p> + +<p>The indignant patriot who was convinced that chicane alone saved the +So-and-So Club from being dedicated to the service of the wounded was +quite unable to tell me whether the lifts—assuming that lifts +existed—were roomy enough to accommodate stretchers; whether, if so, no +interval of stairs prevented trollies from being wheeled to every ward; +whether the arrangement of the building would allow of the network of +plumbing necessitated by the introduction of numerous bathrooms and +lavatories (for each ward must possess both); whether the kitchens were +so located that they could supply food to top-floor patients without +waste of carrying labour on the part of the orderlies' staff. These +problems, the mere fringe of the subject, had never occurred to our +patriot. His idea of a hospital was a place where soldiers lie in <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span>bed +and get well. (What queer notions visitors absorb of the <i>easiness</i> of +hospital life!) He had not glimpsed the organisation which made the cure +possible. The man in bed, a Sister hovering in the background with, +apparently, nothing to do but look pleasant—these constituted, for him, +the final phenomena of a war hospital. These phenomena, instead of being +housed in a wood-and-corrugated-iron shed, might have been staged +picturesquely in one of the luxurious salons of the So-and-So Club in +Pall Mall. It was a shame that they weren't. He would write to the +papers about it. Somebody must be blamed, somebody must be made to +hustle. And meanwhile the Sisters and doctors who <i>were</i> installed in +gorgeous mansions for their work were openly envying the fortunate ones +who had been given those bare but efficient and compactly-planned sheds.</p> + +<p>Some years ago a number of public buildings were earmarked for hospital +use in case of war. It may surprise the indignant patriots to learn that +any preparations whatever were made prior to the outbreak in 1914. +Nevertheless all kinds of prepara<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span>tions actually were made. Mistakes and +miscalculations may have marred those preparations: the fact remains +that, as far as the Territorial Medical Service was concerned, the +authorities had merely to press a button and hospitals came into +existence. Thus a number of institutions—mostly schools—found +themselves ejected from their own roof-trees: found, in short, (what +many other folk were to learn later) that the State is omnipotent in +war-time and that sectional interests fade into insignificance compared +with the interests of the safety of the commonwealth. Some conception of +the promptness with which this paper scheme of Sir Alfred Keogh's +materialised at the outbreak of war may be gathered from the simple +statement that the building of which I myself write was an Orphans' Home +on August 4th, 1914. At 6 a.m. on August 5th it was a military hospital.</p> + +<p>I do not say that it was a military hospital in working order. But if, +by a miracle, wounded <i>had</i> turned up then, there was at least a staff +of medical officers and orderlies on the premises to receive <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span>them. In +point of fact it was some weeks before the first patients arrived. Those +weeks, however, were not idle ones. The layman who considers that any +large building can be turned instantaneously into a hospital would have +had an eye-opener if he had witnessed the work done here. The mere +removing of 95 per cent. of the institution's furniture was a colossal +task; added thereto was the introduction of hundreds of beds, hundreds +of mattresses, hundreds of sets of bedclothes, hundreds of suits of +pyjamas, hundreds of—But why prolong a brain-racking list? Then there +was the pulling-down and fixing-up of partitions, the removal of every +single window for replacement by Hopper sashes, the fitting-in of +bathrooms, lavatories, ward-kitchens, sink-rooms, dispensary, cookhouse, +operating-theatre, pathological laboratory, linen-store, steward's +store, clothing-store, detention-room, administration offices, X-ray +department ... all these in a building which, spacious and handsome +outwardly, was, as to its interior, a characteristic maze in the +Scottish baronial style of architecture beloved by mid-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span>Victorian +philanthropists. How the evicted orphans will like to return to those +stone-flagged passages and large airy dormitories, after having +experienced the comforts of the banal but snug suburban villas in which +they are at present located, I know not. There is a certain dignity +about the Scottish baronial pile, I admit. The silhouette of its grey +stone façade, rising above delightful lawns, makes a good +impression—from a distance. Postcard views of it sell freely to +visitors. But the best part of our hospital is hidden behind that +turreted façade, and is much too "ugly" and utilitarian for postcard +immortalisation.</p> + +<p>The best part of our hospital—<i>the</i> hospital, to most of us—came into +being when the commandeered Scottish baronial orphans' asylum was found +to be too small. Then were built "the huts."</p> + +<p>The word "hut" suggests something casual, of the camping-out order: a +shed knocked together with tin-tacks, doubtfully weather-proof and +probably scamped by profiteering contractors. Of the huts provided at +certain training centres this may have been true. The finely austere +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span>and efficient ranks of hut-wards which constitute the main part of the +3rd London General Hospital are the very antithesis of that picture. +They may look flimsy. They were certainly put up at a remarkable pace. I +myself witnessed the erection of the final fifty of them. An open field +vanished in less than a month, and "Bungalow Town" (as someone nicknamed +it) appeared. You would have said that such speed meant countless +imperfections of detail. No doubt some tinkerings and modifications were +bound to follow, when the regiment of workmen, carpenters, engineers, +drainage specialists, electricians, had vanished. But, in the long run, +the ideal hospital remained—a hospital with which the So-and-So Club in +Pall Mall, for all its luxuriousness, could never hope to compare.</p> + +<p>There are still a dozen wards—used mostly for medical cases—in the +Scottish baronial building. Its rooms, too, provide the Administration +with offices. Its great Dining Hall is a splendid Receiving Ward for the +sorting-out and clearance of newly-arrived convoys of patients. We +should be poorly situated indeed if we had not our<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> Scottish baronial +main building to be the hub of the hospital's activities, or rather the +handle from which springs the fan of the hospital's great extension—the +huts. Approaching the hospital the visitor sees nothing of those huts. +As he walks up the drive he flatters himself that he has reached his +destination. He discovers his mistake when, at the inquiry bureau in the +entrance, he is informed that the patient whom he has come to interview +is (say) in "C 13." He is advised to go down the passage on his left, +turn to his right, turn to the left again and then again to the +right—after which he had better seek a further re-direction. Launching +himself optimistically on this voyage he learns, long ere he has +attained his goal, that a modern war-hospital can hide a considerable +extent of pedestrianism behind a comparatively short Scottish baronial +frontage. He will be fortunate if five minutes' steady tramping brings +him to the bedside of his friend in C 13.</p> + +<p>Perhaps he will content himself in his footsoreness by noting that, to +reach C 13, he has not had to go up or down any stairs. This is one of +the beauties of the hut system.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> It consumes a big area, but it is all +on one level—the ground level. The patient on crutches can go anywhere +without fear of tripping, the patient in a wheeled chair can propel +himself anywhere, the orderlies can push wheeled stretchers or +dinner-wagons anywhere. Our visitor for C 13, having escaped from the +back of the Scottish baronial building, emerges into a vista of covered +corridors, wooden-floored, galvanised-iron roofed. It is a heartbreaking +vista to the poor woman who has had no bus-fare and is burdened by a +baby in arms. It is a vista which seems to have no end. Corridor +branches out of corridor—A Corridor, B Corridor, C Corridor, D +Corridor, each with its perspective of doors opening into wards; and +shorter corridors leading to store-rooms and the like. But the patient +or orderly who has dwelt in a hospital where, though distances are +shorter, staircases are involved—or where every trifling +coming-and-going of goods or stretchers necessitates the manipulation of +a lift—blesses those level, smooth corridors, with their facile access +to any ward, to operating theatres, kitchens, stores, X-ray <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span>room, +massage department, etc., and their stepless exit into the open air.</p> + +<p>Looked at from outside, a hut-ward is—to the æsthetic eye—a hideous +structure. Knowing what it stands for, the science, the tenderness and +the fundamental civilisation which it represents, we may descry, behind +its stark geometrical outlines, a real nobility and beauty. Entering a +typical hut-ward you behold thirty beds, fifteen on each side of the +room. Between each pair of beds is a locker in which the patient stows +his belongings. (Woe betide him if his locker is not kept neat!) In the +central aisle of the room are the Sister's writing-table, certain other +tables, chairs, and two coke stoves for heating purposes in winter. The +floor is carpetless, and maintained in a meticulous state of high gloss +by means of daily polishings. At a height of a few feet from the floor, +the asbestos-lined walls cease and become windows. There is no gap in +the continuous line of windows all down each side of the ward—a special +type of window which, even when open, declines to allow rain to enter. +In consequence of these windows the ward is not only very well lit, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span>but +also airy and odourless. When all the windows are open (which is the +case throughout the entire summer and generally the case in winter also) +the patient has the advantages of indoor comfort plus an outdoor +atmosphere. At the end of the ward a covered verandah is spacious enough +to take an extra couple of beds for those requiring completely open-air +treatment.</p> + +<p>The ward proper has certain additions: a kitchen with gas-stove and +geyser; a sink-room with geyser and cleansing apparatus of special +pattern; a bathroom with geyser; lavatories; a small room for the +isolation of a patient on the danger-list; a linen-room; and cupboards. +All these are packed neatly under that one rectangular corrugated roof +which looked so ugly and so unpromising from outside.</p> + +<p>Do not pity the wounded soldier because he is quartered in a "hut." The +word sounds unattractive. But if it is the right kind of hut, he is in +the soundest and most sanitary type of temporary hospital that the mind +of man has yet devised. The rain-drops may rattle a shade noisily on the +roof, the asbestos lining may be devoid of orna<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span>mentation, but as he +lies in bed and contemplates that unadorned ceiling he is a deal better +off than if he were gazing at the elaborate (and dust-harbouring) +cornices of the So-and-So Club's grandiose smoking-lounge in Pall Mall.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2> + +<h2>FROM THE "D" BLOCK WARDS</h2> + + +<p>If you walk up the corridor at half-past four on certain afternoons of +the week you will meet a mob of patients trooping from their wards to +the concert-room. Being built of wood and corrugated iron, the corridor +is an echoing cave of noises. It echoes the tramp of feet—and +army-pattern boots were not soled for silence. It echoes the thud-thud +of crutches. It echoes the slurred rumble of wheeled chairs and +stretcher-trollies. But, above all, at half-past four on concert days it +echoes happy talk and chaff and boisterous laughter.</p> + +<p>As often as not, the loudest talk, the cheeriest chaff, the most +spontaneous laughter, emanate from the blue-clad stalwarts who have +mustered from the "D" Block wards.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span></p><p>"D" Block contains the wards for eye-wound cases.</p> + +<p>Here they come, a string of them, mostly with bandages round their +heads. The leading man owns one good eye—a twinkling eye—an eye of +mischief—an eye (you would guess at once) for the girls. (But the eye's +owner probably calls them the "pushers." Such is our language now.) +Behind him, in single file, and in step with him, march a gang of +patients each with his hand on the shoulder of the man in front. Tramp, +tramp! Their tread is purposely thunderous on the bare boards of the +corridor. They sing as they advance. It is a ragtime chorus whose most +memorable line runs, "You never seem to kiss me in the same place +twice." A jaunty lilt, to be sure, both in tune and in rhythm. Tramp, +tramp! The one-eyed leader swerves round a corner, roaring the refrain. +His followers swerve too. Suddenly the Matron is encountered, emerging +from her room. "Fine afternoon, Matron!" The leader interrupts his chant +to utter this hearty greeting. And, with one voice, "Fine afternoon, +Matron!" exclaim his followers. But they do not turn <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span>their heads. Each +with his hand resting on the shoulder of the man in front they go +steadily on, towards the concert-room, with an odd intentness, glancing +neither to one side nor the other. For though, at their leader's cue, +they have hailed the Matron, they have not seen her. They are blind.</p> + +<p>The spectacle of men—particularly young men—who have given their sight +for their country is, to most observers, a moving one. Melancholy are +the reflections of the visitor who meets, for the first time, a +promenading party of our blind patients. It is the plain truth, +nevertheless, that the blind men themselves are far from melancholy. One +of the rowdiest characters we ever had in the hospital was totally +blind. The blind men's wards are notoriously amongst the least sedate. I +offer no explanation. I simply state the fact. I will fortify it by an +anecdote.</p> + +<p>It came to pass that eight complimentary tickets for a Queen's Hall +matinée were received by the Matron, who in due course allotted them to +seven "D" Block patients. An orderly, detailed to take them to the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span>hall, completed the octette. Corporal Smith, the orderly in question, +recounted his adventures afterwards. "Never again," quoth he, "shall I +jump at a matinée job if there are blind chaps in the party. They're the +deuce."</p> + +<p>You must understand that we hospital orderlies regard the task of +shepherding patients to an entertainment in town as an agreeable form of +holiday. I have had some very pleasant outings of that sort myself. But +not—I am thankful to recall, in the light of Corporal Smith's +narrative—with blind men. One-legged men are often a sufficient care, +in manœuvring on and off omnibuses. Apparently helpless cripples have +a marvellous gift for losing themselves, entering wrong trains, and +generally escaping—as the hour for return draws nigh—from one's +custody. And the city seems to be full of lunatics ready to supply +alcohol or indigestible refreshments to the most delicate war-hospital +inmates. Even with ordinary patients the orderly's afternoon excursion +is sometimes not unfraught with anxiety. But blind patients, as Corporal +Smith said, are the deuce.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span></p><p>Out of his party, four were totally blind, two could recognise dimly +the difference between light and darkness, and one had a single good +eye.</p> + +<p>Queen's Hall was reached, by bus, without mishap. After the performance +there was tea at an A.B.C. shop. Here Jock, one of the totally blind +men, a Scotchman—all Scots are "Jocks" in the army—distinguished +himself by facetiæ (audible throughout the whole shop) on the English +pronunciation of the word 'scone,' and intimated his desire to treat the +company to a ballad. This project was suppressed, but "a silly fool in a +top hat threatened to report me for having given my men drink," said +Corporal Smith. "Jock gave <i>him</i> the bird, not 'arf. But I thought it +about time to be going home."</p> + +<p>So the party prepared to go home.</p> + +<p>The bus was voted dull. Somebody suggested the tube. Corporal Smith +consented.</p> + +<p>He had forgotten that at Oxford Circus station the lifts have been +abolished in favour of sliding staircases. Confronted by the escalator, +Corporal Smith halted his party and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span>informed them that they must walk +down by the ordinary stair. The escalator was not safe for blind men. +Unfortunately, Jock had sniffed a lark; the one-eyed man backed him up; +the party—elated perhaps by their tea—would not hear of anything so +humdrum as a descent by the ordinary stair. They were going on the +sliding stair. They insisted. Corporal Smith argued in vain. In vain he +exerted his (purely nominal) authority. His charges mocked him. The +one-eyed man leading, with Jock in his wake, they launched themselves at +the sliding stair. In sheer desperation Corporal Smith brought up the +rear, supporting two of the more timid venturers as best he might. None +of the group except Corporal Smith himself, as it turned out, had ever +travelled on an escalator before. But they had heard a comic song about +a sliding stair, and they wished—Jock especially—to sample this +metropolitan invention.</p> + +<p>By dodging forward to place each blind man's hand upon the banister, +Corporal Smith managed to send off his patients without a stumble. But +as the stair inexorably lowered them into the bowels of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span>the earth he +realised, only too vividly, what might happen at the foot of the +descent. The evening rush of suburb-bound passengers had begun and the +staircase was rather crowded. Nobody seemed to realise that the +khaki-overcoated men who stood so still upon the steps were not the +usual hospital convalescents out on leave and able to look after +themselves. Corporal Smith, delayed by one man who had hesitated at the +top before taking the plunge, beheld his charges below him, hopelessly +dotted, at intervals, amongst the general public. It was impossible for +him to struggle down ahead, to the bottom of the staircase, to guide the +men off as they arrived. This task, he hoped, would be adequately +performed by the one-eyed man.</p> + +<p>It might have been. The one-eyed man was game for anything. But Jock, +arriving in the highest good humour at the bottom of the staircase, was +tilted sideways by the curve, and promptly sat down on the +landing-place. Instead of rising, he proclaimed aloud that this was +funnier even than England's pronunciation of the word<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> 'scone.' +Whereupon various hurrying passengers, including an old lady, tripped +over his prone form. The sensation of being kicked and sat upon appealed +to Jock's sense of humour. The more people avalanched across him the +more comic he thought it. And in a moment there was quite a pile of +wriggling bodies on top of him. For though the public managed on the +whole to leap over, or circumvent, the obstacle presented by Jock's +extremely large body, none of his blind comrades did so.</p> + +<p>"Every single one of them fell flop," said Corporal Smith; "I give you +my word."</p> + +<p>But were they downhearted? No! They regarded this mysterious hurly-burly +of arms and legs as a capital jest. So far from being alarmed or +annoyed, they shouted with glee. The old lady, who had gathered herself +together and was directing a stream of voluble reproof at Corporal Smith +for his "callousness and cruelty to these unhappy blind heroes," retired +discomfited. Jock's comments routed her more effectively than the +Corporal's assur<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span>ance that the episode was none of his choosing.</p> + +<p>The party at last sorted itself out and was placed upon its feet once +more. It was excessively pleased with its exploit. Hilarity reigned. +Corporal Smith, relieved, made ready to conduct his squad to the +platform.</p> + +<p>Alas, a bright idea occurred to Jock. Why not go up the other sliding +stair and down again?</p> + +<p>Agreed, <i>nem. con.</i> At least, Corporal Smith's <i>con.</i> was too futile to +be worth counting.</p> + +<p>"I had to go with the blighters," said he. "There was no end of a crowd +by this time. And Jock and some of the others fell over at the top +again. And there was a row with the ticket-collector. And people kept +saying they'd report me. <i>Me!</i> And when I'd got my party down to the +bottom for the second time, and some of the tube officials had come and +said they couldn't allow it and we must buzz off home, I lined the +fellows up to march 'em to the train, and dash me if two weren't +missing. They'd given me the slip."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span></p><p>The two truants, it may be added, could not be found. Corporal Smith +had to return without them. At a late hour of the evening they appeared, +not an atom repentant, at the hospital, having persuaded someone to put +them into the correct bus. One of them, Jock, explained that, being from +the North, he had desired to seize this opportunity of seeing the sights +of London. Jock, I may remind you, is totally blind. Jock's guide, the +man who had volunteered to show him the sights and who had only once +been in London before, could see very faintly the difference between +light and dark.... Thus this pair of irresponsibles had fared forth into +the dusk of Regent Street.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>It sounds a very horrible fate to be blinded. But somehow the blind men +themselves seldom seem to be overwhelmed by its horribleness. If you +want to hear the merriest banter in a war hospital, visit the blind +men's wards. The pathos of them lies less in the sadness of the victims +than in the triumphant, wonderful fact <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span>that they are <i>not</i> sad. I wish +we others all inhabited the same mysteriously jocund spiritual realm as +Jock and his comrades, who come tramp-tramping to the concert-room down +the corridor from the D wards.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2> + +<h2>WHEN THE WOUNDED ARRIVE</h2> + + +<p>The receiving hall of the hospital is its clearing house of patients. It +is a huge room, with a lofty and echoing roof, a little in the style of +a church. Before the war, when the building was a school, this rather +grandiose apartment no doubt witnessed speechifyings and prize +distributions. May the time be not far distant when it will once again +be used for those observances! Meanwhile its vast floor is occupied by +ranks of beds.</p> + +<p>Those beds are generally untenanted. Visitors who, like the lady in the +play, have taken the wrong turning, are apt to find themselves in the +receiving hall, and, gazing at its array of vacant beds, have been known +to conclude that the hospital was empty. (As if any war-hospital, in +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span>these times, could be empty!) But our patients have only a short +acquaintanceship with the receiving-hall beds: these beds are momentary +resting-places on their journey healthwards: they are not meant to lie +in but to lie <i>on</i>. The three-score wards for which the receiving hall +is the clearing house are the real destination of the patients; down +long corridors, in wards far cosier because less ornate than this, the +patient will find "his" bed ready for him, the bed which he is not to +lie on but <i>in</i>.</p> + +<p>We orderlies meet each convoy at the front door of the hospital. The +walking-cases are the first to arrive—men who are either not ill +enough, or not badly enough wounded, to need to be put on stretchers in +ambulances. They come from the station in motor-cars supplied by that +indefatigable body, the London Ambulance Column. The walking-case +alights from his car, is conducted into the receiving hall, and ten +minutes later is in the bathroom. For the ritual of the bath must on no +account be omitted—although now not so obviously imperative as in the +early period <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span>of the war. Few patients reach us who have not first +sojourned, either for a day or two or for weeks, in hospitals in France. +They are therefore merely travel-stained, as you or I might be +travel-stained after coming over from Dublin to Euston. The bath is thus +a pleasure more than a necessity. Whereas there <i>was</i> an era, when our +guests came straight from only too populous trenches....</p> + +<p>"O.C. Baths," as the bathroom orderly was nicknamed, had to be +circumspect in the performance of his job.</p> + +<p>The few minutes which the walking-case spends in the receiving hall are +occupied (1) in drinking a cup of cocoa, and (2) in "having his +particulars taken."</p> + +<p>Poor soul!—he is weary of giving his "particulars." He has had to give +them half-a-dozen times at least, perhaps more, since he left the front. +At the field dressing-station they wanted his particulars, at the +clearing-station, on the train, at the base hospital, on another train, +on the steamer, on the next train, and now in this English hospital. As +he sits and comforts himself with cocoa, a "V.A.D."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> hovers at his +elbow, intent on a printed sheet, the details of which she is rapidly +filling-in with a pencil. For this is a card-index war, a colossal +business of files and classifications and ledgers and statistics and +registrations, an undertaking on a scale beside which Harrod's and +Whiteley's and Selfridge's and Wanamaker's and the Magazin du Louvre, +all rolled into one, would be a fleabite of simplicity. Ere the morrow +shall have dawned, our patient's military biography will be recounted, +by various clerks, in I don't know how many different entries. If you +are curious, refer to one of our volumes of the <i>Admission and Discharge +Book: Field Service Army Book 27a</i>. Open it at any of its +closely-written pages and see the host of ruled columns which the +orderly in charge of it must inscroll with reference to each of the many +thousands of patients who pass through our hospital per annum. The +columns ask for his Regiment; Squadron, Battery or Company; Number; +Rank; Surname; Christian Name; Age; Length of Service; Completed Months +with Field Force; Diseases (wounds and injuries are <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span>expressed by a +number indicating their nature and whereabouts); Date of Admission; Date +of Discharge or Transfer; Number of Days under Treatment; Number of +Ward; Religion; and "Observations"—a space usually occupied by the name +of the hospital ship upon which our friend crossed the Channel, and the +name of the convalescent home to which he went on bidding us adieu.</p> + +<p>Having furnished the preliminary statements which lay the foundation of +this compendious memoir, the walking-case thankfully finishes his cocoa, +picks up the package of "blues" which has been put at his side, and +departs, with his fellows, to the bathroom. Here he is tackled by the +Pack Store orderlies, who take from him, and enter in their books, his +khaki clothes. These he must leave in exchange for the blue slop uniform +which, <i>pro tem.</i>, is to be his only wear. When he emerges from the +bathroom he is attired in what is now England's most honourable +livery—the royal blue of the war-hospital patient. And (though perhaps +the matter is not mentioned to him in so many words) his <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span>own suit is +already ticketed with an identification label and on its way to the +fumigator. This is no reflection on the owner of the suit ... but there +are some things we don't talk about. Mr. Fumigator-Wallah is not the +least busy of the more retiring members of a war-hospital staff. He is +not in the limelight; but you might come to be very sad and sorry if he +took it into his head to neglect his unapplauded part off-stage.</p> + +<p>The walking-cases are still splashing and dressing in the bathroom when +the ambulances with the cot-cases begin to appear. Now is the orderlies' +busy time. Each stretcher must be quickly but gently removed from the +ambulance and carried into the receiving hall.</p> + +<p>Four orderlies haul the stretcher from its shelf in the ambulance; two +orderlies then take its handles and carry it indoors. At the entrance to +the receiving hall they halt. The Medical Officer bends over the +patient, glances at the label which is attached to him, and assigns him +to a ward. (Certain types of cases go to certain groups of wards.) The +attendant sergeant <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span>promptly picks a metal ticket from a rack and lays +it on the stretcher. The ticket has, punched on it, the number of the +patient's ward and the number of the patient's bed in that ward. This +ceremony completed, the orderlies proceed, with their burden, up the +aisle between the beds in the receiving hall.</p> + +<p>Arrived at the bed, they lower their stretcher until it is at such a +level that the patient, if he is active enough, can move off it on to +the bed; if he is too weak to help himself he is lifted on to the bed by +orderlies under the direction of the receiving-hall Sister. The +stretcher is promptly removed and restored to its ambulance. If the +patient is in an exceptionally suffering condition he is not placed on +the receiving-hall bed; instead—the Medical Officer having given his +permission—his stretcher is put on a wheeled trolley and he is taken +straight away to his ward, so that he will only undergo one shift of +position between the ambulance and his destination. The majority of +stretcher-cases, however, reach us in a by no means desperate state, +for, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span>as I say, they seldom come to England without having been treated +previously at a base abroad (except during the periods of heavy +fighting). And it is remarkable how often the patient refuses help in +getting off the stretcher on to the bed. He may be a cocoon of bandages, +but he will courageously heave himself overboard, from stretcher to bed, +with a gay <i>wallop</i> which would be deemed rash even in a person in +perfect health. Our receiving hall, at a big intake of wounded, when +every bed bears its poor victim of the war, presents a spectacle which +might give the philosopher food for thought; but I suspect that, if he +regarded its actualities rather than his own preconceptions, what would +impress him more than the sadness would be on the one hand the +kindliness, brisk but not officious, of the staff, and on the other the +spontaneous geniality of the battered occupants of the beds. The +orderlies can spare little time for talk, but the few chats which they +are able to have with patients whom they are helping to change their +clothes, or to whom they are proffering the inevitable <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span>cocoa (which is +a cocktail, as it were, prior to the meal which will be served in the +men's own ward), are punctuated by jokes and laughter rather than the +long-visaged "sympathy" which the outsider might—quite wrongly!—have +pictured as appropriate to such an assemblage.</p> + +<p>The stretcher-case, before he is taken to his ward, must also "give his +particulars," must also be interviewed by the Pack Store officials, and +must also have assigned to him his blue uniform (wherewith are a shirt, +a cravat, slippers and socks) in anticipation of the time when he shall +be able to use his feet again and promenade our corridors and grounds. +He receives the customary packet of cigarettes (probably the second, for +he often gets one at the railway station too), and then, on another +stretcher, mounted on a trolley, is wheeled off to his ward. Here, +bestowed in bed at last, we leave him to his blanket-bath, his meal, his +temperature-taking and chart filling-in by the Sister, his visit from +the doctor, and all the rest of it. For the moment we see no more of +him; we must race back to the receiving hall, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span>and, if there are no more +patients to take away, return the trolley to its proper nook, put +straight the blankets and pillows on the beds, sweep the floor, and tidy +up generally, in readiness for the next convoy's advent.</p> + +<p>Presently the huge room, beneath its dim arched ceiling, is silent and +empty once more. The four ranks of beds, without a crease on their brown +blankets, are bare of occupants. The Sister and her probationers have +vanished. The Pack Store orderlies have carried off their loot of dirty +khaki tunics and trousers for the fumigator. The clerical V.A.D.'s have +gone to enter "particulars" in ledgers and card-indices. The cookhouse +people have removed their cocoa urn. The sergeant is inspecting the +metal ward-tickets left in his rack. A glance at them tells him how many +beds, and which beds, are free in the hospital; for the tickets have no +duplicates; any given ticket can only reappear in the rack when the bed +which it connotes is out of use and awaiting a newcomer; the ticket +hangs from a nail in the wall beside the patient's bed <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span>just so long as +that bed is tenanted. So the rack of metal tickets might almost take the +place of that important document, of which a freshly-compiled edition is +typed every morning, the Empty Bed List; and the sergeant is meditative +as he sorts into the rack the tickets which have newly been sent in from +the Sisters of wards where there have been departures. "Not much room in +the eye-wound wards," he ponders; or, "A lot of empties in the +medicals." And then ... the tinkle of the telephone....</p> + +<p>"Another convoy expected at 6.15? Twenty walking-cases and seventeen +cots. Right you are!"</p> + +<p>And at 6.15 the party of orderlies will be back again at the front door, +again the motor-cars will stream up the drive, again the ambulances will +come with their stretchers, and again the receiving hall will awaken +from its interlude of silence to echo with the activities incidental to +a clearing house of those damaged human bundles which are the <i>raison +d'être</i> of our great war-hospital.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2> + +<h2>"T.... A...."</h2> + + +<p>War-hospital patients are of many sorts. It is a common mistake of the +arm-chair newspaper devourer to lump all soldiers together as quaint, +bibulous, aitch-dropping innocents, lamblike and gauche in +drawing-rooms, fierce and picturesque on the field, who (to judge by +their published photographs) are continually on the grin and continually +shaking hands either with each other or with equally grinsome French +peasant women at cottage doors or with the local mayor who congratulates +them on the glorious V.C.'s which, of course, they are continually +winning. In a war hospital that harbours many thousands of patients per +annum, we should know, in the long run, something about the +characteristics of Tommy Atkins; and it is with resent<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span>ment that I hear +him thus classified as a mere type. He is not a type. Discipline and +training have given him some veneer of generalised similarities. Beneath +these, Tommy Atkins is simply the man in the street—any man in any +street; and if you look out of your window in the city and see a throng +of pedestrians upon the pavement you might just as well say that because +they are all civilians they are all alike as that, because all soldiers +wear khaki, they are all alike.</p> + +<p>I have a quarrel with the Press on the score of its persistent fostering +of this notion that "our gallant lads" (as the sentimental scribe calls +them) are a pack of children about whose exploits an unfailing stream of +semi-pathetic, semi-humorous anecdotes must be put forth. Even the old +professional army exhibited no dead level either of blackguards on the +one hand or humble Galahads on the other. But whatever may have been the +case before the war, all the armies of Europe are now alike in this, +that they are composed of civilians who merely happen to have adopted a +certain garb for the performance of a certain <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span>job—and, be it remarked, +a temporary job. That garb has not reduced the citizens, who have the +honour to wear it, to a monotonous level either of intelligence or of +conduct: nor even of opinions about the war itself. I have had +fire-eaters in my ward who breathed the sentiments of <i>John Bull</i> and +the <i>Evening News</i>, and I have had pacifists (they seemed to have fought +no less bravely) who, week by week, read and approved Mr. Snowden in the +<i>Labour Leader</i>; I have had Radicals and Tories, and patients who cared +for neither party, but whose passion was cage-birds or boxing or amateur +photography; I have had patients who were sulky and patients who were +bright, patients who were unlettered and patients who were educated, +patients who could hardly express themselves without the use of an +ensanguined vocabulary and patients who were gently spoken and +fastidious. Each of them was Tommy Atkins—the inanely smirking hero of +the picture-paper and the funny paragraph. Neither his picture nor the +paragraph may be positively a lie, and yet, when the arm-chair dweller +chucklingly draws attention to them, I am tempted to relapse <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span>into +irreverence and utter one or other (or perhaps both) of two phrases +which T. Atkins is himself credited with using <i>ad nauseam</i>—"Na-poo" +and "I <i>don't</i> think."</p> + +<p>When I assert—as I do unhesitatingly assert—that no one could work in +a war-hospital ward for any length of time without an ever-deepening +respect and fondness for Tommy Atkins, it is the same thing as asserting +that the respect and fondness are evoked by close contact with one's +countrymen: nothing more nor less. A hospital ward is a haphazard +selection of one's fellow-Britons: the most wildly haphazard it is +possible to conceive. And the pessimistic cynic who, after a sojourn in +that changing company for a month or two can still either generalise +about them or (if he does) can still not acknowledge that in the mass +they are amazingly lovable, is beyond hope. The war has taught its +lessons to us all, and none more important than this. For myself I +confess that I never knew before how nice were nine out of ten of the +individuals with whom I sat silent in trains, whom I glanced at in +business offices or behind <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span>counters, whom I saw in workshops or in the +field or who were my neighbours in music-halls. They were strangers. In +the years to come I hope they will be strangers no longer. For they and +I have dressed alike and borne the same surname—Atkins.</p> + +<p>Of course, there remain a few generalisations which <i>can</i> safely be +risked about even so nondescript a person as the new Tommy Atkins. As +practically all the Tommy Atkinses are, at this moment, concentrated on +the prosecution of one great job, it is natural that their main +interests should revolve round that job. They all (for instance) want +the job to be finished. They all (within my experience) want it to be +finished well. They nearly all desire earnestly to cease soldiering as +soon as the job <i>is</i> finished well. I never yet met the man (though he +may exist, outside the brains of the scribes aforementioned) who, having +tasted the joys of roughing it, is determined not to return to a humdrum +desk in an office: on the contrary, that office and that humdrum desk +have now become this travelled adventurer's most <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span>roseate dream. I have +conversed with patients drawn from nearly every walk in life, and I do +not remember one who definitely spoke of refusing to go back to his +former work—if he could get it.</p> + +<p>One of my patients had been a subterranean lavatory attendant. You would +have thought his ambitions—after visits to Egypt, Malta, the +Dardanelles and France—might have soared to loftier altitudes. He had +survived hair-raising adventures; he had taken part in the making of +history; although wounded he had not been incapacitated for an active +career in the future; and he was neither illiterate nor unintelligent. +Yet he told me, with obvious satisfaction, that his place was being kept +open for him. I was, as it were, invited to rejoice with him over the +destiny which was his. I may add that the singular revelations which he +imparted as to the opportunities for extra earnings in his troglodyte +trade extorted from me a more enthusiastic sympathy than might be +supposed possible.</p> + +<p>That agreeable domestic pet, <i>homo sapiens</i>, remains unchanged even when +you dress <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span>him up in a uniform and set him fighting. He is always +consistently inconsistent; he is always both reasonable and +unreasonable. You can try to cast him in a mould, but he resumes his +normal shapelessness the moment the mould is removed. Expose him to +frightful ordeals of terror and pain, and he will emerge grumbling about +some petty grievance or carrying on a flirtation with another man's wife +or squabbling about sectarian dogmas or gambling on magazine +competitions or planning new businesses—in fact, behaving precisely as +the natural lord of creation always does behave. No member of our +hospital staff, I imagine, will ever forget the arrival of the first +batch of exchanged British wounded prisoners; It was the most tragic +scene I have ever witnessed. It is a fact, for which I make no apology, +that tears were shed by some of those whose task it was to welcome that +pitiful band of martyrs. We had received convoys of wounded many a time, +but <i>these</i> broken creatures, so pale, so neglected, so thin and so +infinitely happy to be free once more, had a poignant appeal which must +have melted the most rigid official.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> (And we are neither very official, +here, nor very rigid.) Well, amongst these liberated captives was one +who told a sad tale of starvation at his internment camp. There is +little doubt that it was a true tale, in the main. On that I make no +comment. I simply introduce you to this gentleman, who had been restored +to his native land after ten months of entombment, in order to mention +that on the following morning, when his breakfast was placed before him, +he turned up his nose at it. Loudly complaining of the poorness of the +food, he leant out of bed, picked up a brown-paper parcel which had been +his only luggage, and produced from it some German salted herring, which +he proceeded to eat with grumbling gusto.</p> + +<p>That is not specially Tommy Atkins; it is <i>homo sapiens</i> of the +hearthside, whether in suburban villa or in slum, for ever dissatisfied +(more especially with his victuals) and for ever evoking our affection +all the same.</p> + +<p>No; Tommy Atkins is never twice alike. He is unanimous on few debatable +matters. One of them, as I have said, is the desir<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span>ability of finishing +the war—in the proper way. (But even here there are differences as to +what constitutes the proper way.) Another is (I trust I shall not shock +the reader) the extreme displeasingness of life at the front. I would +not say that our hospital patients are positively thankful to be +wounded, nor that they do not wish to recover with reasonable rapidity. +But that they are glad to be safe in England once more is undeniable. +The more honour to them that few, if any, flinch from returning to +duty—when they know only too well what that duty consists of. But they +make no bones about their opinion. Not long ago I was the conductor of a +party of convalescents who went to a special matinée of a military +drama. The theatre was entirely filled with wounded soldiers from +hospitals, plus a few nurses and orderlies. It was an inspiring sight. +The drama went well, and its patriotic touches received their due meed +of applause. But when the heroine, in a moving passage, declared that +she had never met a wounded British soldier who was not eager to get +back to the front, there arose, in an instant, a spontaneous <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span>shout of +laughter from the whole audience. That was Tommy Atkins unanimous for +once.</p> + +<p>He was unanimous too, I should add, in perceiving immediately that the +actress had been disconcerted by his roar of amusement. The poor girl's +emotional speech had been ruined. She looked blank and stood irresolute. +At once a burst of hand-clapping took the place of the laughter. It was +not ironical, it was friendly and apologetic. "Go ahead!" it said. +"We're sorry. Those lines aren't your fault, anyway. You spoke them very +prettily, and it was a shame to laugh. But the ass of a playwright +hadn't been in the trenches, and if your usual audiences relish that +kind of speech they haven't been there either."</p> + +<p>So much for Tommy Atkins in his unanimous mood—unanimously condemning +cant and at the same time unanimously courteous. Now that I come to +reflect I believe that, in his best moments, these are perhaps the only +two points concerning which Tommy Atkins <i>is</i> unanimous. Whether he +lives up to them or not (and to expect him unflinchingly to live up to +them in season and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span>out of season is about as sensible as to expect him +perpetually to live up to the photographs and anecdotes), we may take +them as his ideal. He dislikes humbug: he tries to be polite. Could one +sketch a sounder scaffolding on which to build all the odd +divergencies—crankinesses and heroisms, stupidities and +engagingnesses—which may go to make the edifice of an average decent +soul's material, mental and spiritual habitation?</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p><i>Postscript.</i>—An expert—one of England's greatest experts—who has +read the above tells me that I have not done justice to the old +professional army men of Mons and the Aisne. When wounded and in our +hospital they <i>did</i> want to go back to fight. But their sole reason, +given with frankness, was that they considered they were needed: the new +army, in training, was not ready: it would be murder to send the new +army out, unprepared, to such an ordeal.</p> + +<p>This authority, who has interviewed many thousands of convalescents, +further remarked: "The wounded man who has been under shell fire and who +professes to be <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span>eager to go back, whether ordered or no, is a liar. On +the other hand, the scrim-shankers who try to get out of going back, +when they should go back, are an amazingly small minority."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> + +<h2>LAUNDRY PROBLEMS</h2> + + +<p>A number of oddly unmasculine duties fell to the lot of the R.A.M.C. +orderly prior to the time when "V.A.D.'s" were allowed to take his place +(at least to some extent) throughout our English war-hospitals. One of +my first tasks in the morning was the collecting and classification of +my ward's dirty linen. The work cannot be called difficult. It would be +an exaggeration to say that it demands a supreme intellectual effort. +But to the male mind it is, at least, rather novel. The average bachelor +has perhaps been accustomed to scrutinise his collars, handkerchiefs and +underclothes before and after their trips to the laundry. He has seldom, +I think, had intimate trafficking with pillow-cases, sheets, +counterpanes and tablecloths. In the reckoning of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span>these he is apt to +make mistakes and to lapse into a casualness which, in a woman familiar +with household routine, would be improbable. "Sister's" sharpest +reproofs were called forth by errors made in connection with this daily +exchange of clean for dirty linen.</p> + +<p>A form, of course, had to be filled in. (The army provides a form for +everything.) This form presents a catalogue of eighty-one separate +items, from "Blankets" ("Child's," "Infant's"—I do not know what is the +difference between them, and I never had to deal with +either—"G.S."—whatever that may be—and "White") to "Waist-coats, +Strait." It distinguishes between ten kinds of "Cases"—pillow-cases, +paillasse-cases, and the like: for example, there are "barrack" +bolster-cases and "hospital" bolster-cases; and you must not confound +"hospital" mattress-cases with "officers'" mattress-cases. You are +misled if you imagine that the heading "Cases" has exhausted the +possibilities which appeared to be latent in that noun; for, in addition +to the ten unqualified "Cases" there are seven more, defined as "Cases, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span>slip." Can you wonder that the orderly, presented with a bin-full of +confused and crumpled objects ready for the wash, and told to count them +and enter their numbers in the appointed columns, occasionally made a +wrong guess? Then there were eight sorts of "Cloths"—tablecloth, +tray-cloth, distinctive cloth, and so forth. (To how many lay minds does +"distinctive cloth" convey any meaning?) Counterpanes you would think to +be obvious enough; but that remarkable compilation, the <i>Check Book for +Hospital Linen</i> ("Printed for H.M. Stationery Office...." etc.), +recognises four varieties. It also allows for four varieties of sheets, +four of aprons and four of trousers. Of towels it knows six.</p> + +<p>Each ward has a certain stock of linen in its cupboard. That stock can +only be kept at the proper level by strict barter of a soiled object for +a clean duplicate of the same object. As there are three hundred and +sixty-five days in the year on which this transaction occurs, and sixty +wards' bundles of linen to be dealt with by both the Dirty Linen +Department and the Clean Linen<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> Department on each of those days, it is +clear that exactitude in the filling-in of the form aforementioned +becomes an affair of almost nightmare importance. Bring back from the +Clean Linen Store three dusters instead of the four dusters which you +previously handed in at the Dirty Linen Store, and your cupboard will, +to the end of time, be short of one duster which it should have +possessed. Even if Sister fails to pounce promptly on the evidence of +the loss, the quartermaster's dread stocktaking will ultimately find you +out. Your cupboard declines to correspond with his book-entries. And +there is trouble brewing, in consequence. (But indeed, if the loss of a +single duster were the sole crime revealed on stocktaking day, you would +be fortunate.)</p> + +<p>The orderly, with an obese bundle of washing on his back, plods from the +ward to the Dirty Linen Store at quarter to nine every morning. I say he +"plods" because the bundle is generally too heavy for transportation at +a rapid pace. Twenty sheets are usually but a part of the bundle; and +twenty sheets are alone no light burden.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> Between his teeth—both his +hands being occupied with the balancing of the bundle—he carries his +chit: that indispensable list. Arrived at the store he dumps the bundle +on the ground, opens it, and pitches its contents piecemeal over a +counter to one of the staff of the store. One by one the objects are +named and counted aloud, as they fly across the counter, the staff +orderly simultaneously checking the list and keeping an eye on what he +is receiving. For we may, by guile, palm off on him one sheet as two. It +can be done, by means of a certain legerdemain which comes with +practice. Or we may have received from the Dry Store, amongst the rags +meant for cleaning purposes, a couple of quite worn-out socks, not a +pair, and long past placing on human feet: these derelicts, with a rapid +motion, can be passed over the counter amongst the good socks, and only +later in the day will the Dirty Linen Store officials detect the +fraud—when it is impossible to locate its perpetrator. The +store-orderly's job is therefore one requiring some astuteness: his +checking of the list has to be achieved at a high speed and in the midst +of a babel; <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span>for as many ward-orderlies are present as the length of the +counter will accommodate, and they are all getting rid of their +dirty-linen bundles at the tops of their voices.</p> + +<p>Altercations, I am afraid, were not infrequent in the epoch when the +actors in this drama were of the male sex. (Even now, when the scene is +mainly feminine, I believe differences of opinion continue to arise, but +doubtless the language in which they are conducted is seemlier if no +less deadly.) The store-orderly had a marvellous eye for the difference +between two kinds of shirts which are worn by our patients. One kind has +a pleat in the back, the other kind hasn't; and I confess I occasionally +transposed them, on the form. It was fatal to do so. There was a +separate line for each brand of shirt and there must be a separate +entry. The store-orderly's trained powers of observation could see that +pleat, or the absence of it, even as the shirt slid across his line of +vision in a torrent of other shirts. His hand shot out and grabbed it +back from joining the heap on the floor within the counter. His pencil +poised itself from the ticking-off of the items on the form.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> "Wrong +again!" he would cry, sometimes in anguish and sometimes in anger. And +there was nothing for it but to apologise. To keep on good terms with +the various orderlies in the various stores was the secret of making +one's life worth living—a secret even profounder than that of keeping +on good terms with Sister: to be sure it was (though she seldom realised +it) the very foundation of the art of keeping on good terms with her. +You could not even begin to please Sister unless, at the end of those +incessant journeyings of yours which she did not see, you had dealings +with store-orderlies who were obliging and who would give you the things +which the taskmistress had sent you to fetch (or would drop a kindly +hint as to where and by what means you could acquire them). The Dirty +Linen Store orderly who declined to accept your plea for forgiveness +when you had been obtuse enough to see a fomentation-wringer in a +teacloth, could devastate the harmony of a whole forenoon. A sweet +reasonableness was undoubtedly the note to strike when such a +contretemps occurred.</p> + +<p>Having got quit of the last item in your <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span>bundle, you returned to the +ward to attend to other (and generally less entertaining) duties until +such time as it was proper to repair to the Clean Linen Store. The staff +of the Clean Linen Store, a huge department whose system of book-keeping +is enough to make the brain reel (for here sheets, etc., are dealt with +not in dozens but in thousands), had in the interim received your chit +from their colleagues of the Dirty Linen Store. These latter, rashly or +otherwise, had guaranteed its accuracy by initialing it. Accordingly, in +the Clean Linen Store, a fresh bundle was ready for your acceptance, its +contents consisting of duplicates of the objects now on their way to the +laundry.</p> + +<p>It was unwise, however, to accept this neatly folded and virginal bundle +without investigation. It might contain what the chit demanded; or it +might not. Before you could carry it off you must yourself initial, and +finally bid farewell to, the chit: thereby certifying that you had got +what you claimed. To make sure of this you would be well advised to undo +the bundle, and (as far as was practicable in a jostling crowd <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span>of +fellow-orderlies similarly employed) run through the whole of its +contents, computing them with precision: twenty sheets, twelve +pillow-cases, nine bolster-cases—it is only too easy to miss the +difference in the sizes of these—seventeen hand-towels, two +operating-aprons, eleven handkerchiefs, ten pyjama trousers, ten +sleeping-jackets, and so on. When you had ticked-off all these separate +items in the list you scribbled your initials thereon and fled with your +bundle—to find, as often as not, that Sister, sorting the things into +her cupboard, could discover a mistake after all. This meant a humble +return to the Clean Linen Store to beg for the mistake's rectification; +and the sergeant in charge had merely to take your chit from his file, +and show you your own initials on it, to prove that you were in the +wrong.</p> + +<p>It is conceivable that by means of a ward stocktaking and a reference of +the results to the figures in the sergeant's huge ledger, you might have +proved that you were not in the wrong. But the only time I ever knew one +of these disputes to be thus put to the test I admit I wished that I had +refrained <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span>from so temerarious an adventure. Somehow or other I had +managed to come back to the ward with three clean pillow-cases fewer +than the tale of dirty ones I had taken away. And Sister was exceedingly +cross. The particular Sister whose drudge I was at that period was +rather apt to be cross; and this was one of her crossest days. She +threatened to "report" me, and in fact did so. I was not—as she seemed +to expect—shot at dawn. I merely underwent a formal reproof from a high +authority who perhaps (but this is a surmise) knew Sister's +idiosyncrasies even better than I did. There remained, nevertheless, the +pressing problem of the three strayed pillow-cases. These Sister +commanded me to obtain from the Clean Linen Store. But you cannot go to +the Clean Linen Store and say "Please give me three pillow-cases." The +Clean Linen Store either says "Why?" (a question which, under the +circumstances, is flatly unanswerable), or else tells you, in language +both firm and ornamental, that you have already had them: your initialed +chit testifies the fact.</p> + +<p>At all events, after some parley, the Clean<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> Linen Store sergeant (who +was less of an ogre than he pretended) offered to strike a bargain with +me. If I would count all the pillow-cases, in and out of use, in my +ward, and bring him the total, he would compare the said total with the +figures in his ledger. Those figures he would not divulge to me. But if +the number I announced was three short of the number in his ledger, he +would give me the three, and say no more about it.</p> + +<p>The bargain seemed a fair one. In Sister's absence I spent a precious +half-hour of what should have been my "afternoon off" in counting all +the pillow-cases I could find in the ward. A good-natured probationer, +who sympathised with me in my difficulties (she too had suffered), +counted them also. A convalescent patient interested himself in the +problem: he also went the round of the beds, and investigated the +cupboard, counting all the pillow-cases. We three each arrived at the +same total. Armed with this total I marched back to the sergeant in the +Clean Linen Store.</p> + +<p>He turned up his ledger and ran his <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span>finger down the page till he came +to the entry of pillow-cases opposite to my ward. And then he laughed a +laugh of fiendish glee.</p> + +<p>"Do you know," he said, "that instead of having three pillow-cases too +few, you've seven too many!"</p> + +<p>Such are the traps set by the business man, the expert of ledgers, for +the innocent amateur. We had actually got more pillow-cases than we were +entitled to. All unwittingly, in my eagerness to placate Sister, I had +published the mild chicanery in which she had indulged on behalf of her +ward. The sergeant, growing grey in the solution of these abstruse +mathematical and psychological mysteries, had suspected this Sister all +along. He enlightened me. She had recently been transferred from another +ward—and in her going had (against the rules) wafted with her a small +selection of that ward's property.... And now there would be a surprise +stocktaking in her new ward: the seven surplus pillow-cases—and perhaps +other loot—would have to be explained. Sister, in short, was in for a +<i>mauvais quart d'heure</i>.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span></p><p>It was a suitable penalty for her crossness. It should have taught her +the perils of crossness. With regret I add that she did not envisage the +episode in that light. She was merely rather crosser than before. It was +without any profound sorrow that I soon afterwards bade her farewell, on +her departure to overseas spheres of activity. But she had at least +afforded me a lesson in the importance of accuracy over my dirty and +clean linen bundles. Never again would I risk the ordeal of a surprise +stocktaking; never again would I risk a combat with a ledger-fortified +sergeant; never again would I risk any attempt at the tortuous in my +dealings with the classifications of the eighty-one items on the +tear-off leaf of that dire volume, the <i>Check Book for Hospital Linen</i>.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IX" id="IX"></a>IX</h2> + +<h2>ON BUTTONS</h2> + + +<p>In one of his recent books Mr. H.G. Wells expresses a surprised +annoyance at the spectacle of spurs. Vast numbers of military gentlemen +(he observed at the front) go clanking about in spurs although they have +never had—and never will have—occasion to bestride a horse. Spurs are +a symbolic survival, a waste of steel and of labour in manufacture, a +futile expenditure of energy to keep clean and to put on and take off.</p> + +<p>When I first enlisted I felt a similar irritation in regard to buttons. +His buttons are a burden to the new recruit. Time takes the edge off his +resentment. Time is a soother of sorrows, a healer of rancours, however +legitimate. Nevertheless one's buttons remain for ever a nuisance. I do +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span>not complain that I should have to make my bed, polish my boots, keep +my clothes neat. These are the obvious decencies of life. But the daily +shining-up of metal buttons which need never have been made of metal at +all, which tarnish in the damp and indeed lose their lustre in an hour +in any weather, which, moreover, look much prettier dull than +bright—this is enough to convert the most bloodthirsty recruit into +obdurate pacifism.</p> + +<p>It is to be presumed that in the pipe-claying days of peace the hours +were apt to hang heavy in barracks, and the furbishing of buttons was +devised not alone for smartness' sake, but to occupy idle hands for +which otherwise Satan might be finding some more mischievous employment. +The theory—though it throws a lurid light on the unprofitableness of a +soldier's profession when there is no war to justify his existence—is +not devoid of sense. But why this custom, designed for that excellent +mortal, the T. Atkins who walked out with nurse-maids, and was none too +busy between-whiles, should be forced upon a totally different (if no +less estimable) T. Atkins <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span>whose job hardly gives him a moment for +meals—let alone for dalliance with the fair—I cannot pretend to +fathom. It is arguable that the ornamental soldier is suited by glossy +buttons and may properly lavish time and trouble thereupon. It is not +arguable that glossy buttons are a valid feature of the garb of a +humdrum and harassed hospital orderly.</p> + +<p>Many a time, footsore and aching with novel toil, I could have groaned +when, instead of lying down to relax, I had to tackle the polishing of +that idiotic panoply of buttons. My tunic had (it still has) five large +buttons in front, four pocket-flap buttons, two shoulder buttons, and +two shoulder numerals, "T.—R.A.M.C.—LONDON." My great-coat had (it +still has) five large front buttons, two shoulder buttons and two +shoulder numerals, three back belt buttons, two coat-tail buttons. My +cap had (it still has) a badge and two small strap-buttons. All these +must be kept brilliant. And, in addition, there was the intricate +brasswork of one's belt.</p> + +<p>Are the wounded any better looked after because a tired orderly has +spent some of his <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span>off-duty rest-hour in rubbing metal buttons which +would have been every bit as buttonable had they been made of bone?</p> + +<p>Many were the debates, in our hut, over the button problem. The +abolition of metal buttons being impracticable—the bold project of a +petition to the King and Lord Kitchener was never proceeded with—two +questions alone interested us: (1) which was the best polish, and (2) +which was the quickest and easiest system of polishing. The shabby +peddler-cum-boot-maker who had somehow established, at that period, a +monopoly of the minor trade of our camp, vended a substance (in penny +tins) called Soldier's Friend. This was a solidified plate-polish of a +pink hue. Having—as per the instructions—"moistened" it, in other +words, spat upon it, you worked up a modicum of the resulting pink mud +with an old toothbrush, then applied same to each button. When you had +rubbed a pink film on to the button you proceeded to rub it off again, +and lo! the tarnish had departed like an evil dream and the metal +glistened as if fresh from the mint. If you <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span>were very particular you +finished the performance with chamois leather. Thereafter you lost the +last precious five minutes before parade in efforts, with knife-blade or +clothesbrush, to remove from your tunic the smears of pink paste which +had failed to repose on the buttons and had stuck to the surrounding +cloth instead. Luckily, Soldier's Friend dries and cakes and powders off +fairly quickly. It is a lovable substance, in its simple behaviour, its +lack of complications. I surmise that somebody has made a fortune out of +manufacturing millions of those penny tins. There is at least one +imitation of Soldier's Friend on the market, and, like most imitations, +it is neither better nor worse than the original. Except for the name on +the outside of the tin, the two commodities cannot be told apart. No +doubt the imitator has likewise made a fortune. If so, both fortunes +have been amassed from a foible to whose blatant uselessness and +wastefulness even a Bond Street jeweller or a de-luxe hotel chef would +be ashamed to give countenance.</p> + +<p>One member of the hut's company, more fastidious than his fellows, +objected to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span>expectorating on to his Soldier's Friend. Rather than do so +he would tramp the fifty yards to our wash-place and obtain a couple of +drops of water from the tap. (The same man thought nothing of keeping a +half-consumed ham, some decaying fruit, and an opened pot of Bovril all +wrapped in his spare clothes in his box under his bed. That is by the +way. I am here concerned not with human nature, but with buttons.) Plain +water, however, was voted less effective than the more popular liquid. +The scientifically minded had a notion that human spittle contained some +acid which Nature had evolved specially to assist the action of +Soldier's Friend. I am bound to say that I was of the anti-plain-water +party myself. For a space I became an adherent of the experimentalists +who moistened their Soldier's Friend with methylated spirit, alleging +that the ensuing polish was more permanent. I lapsed. My small bottle of +methylated spirit came to an end, and on reflection I was not sure that +its superiority over spittle had been proved. Nothing, in the English +climate, can make the sheen of metal buttons endure, at the +outside, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span>more than one day. "Bluebell," "Silvo," and the other +chemico-frictional preparations in favour of which I ultimately +abandoned Soldier's Friend, are alike in this—that their virtue lies in +frequent application, diligence and elbow-grease. They are, every one, +excellent. Their inventors deserve our gratitude. But our gratitude to +their inventors must be nothing compared with their inventors' gratitude +to the person who decreed that the hard-pressed T. Atkins of the Great +War should wear (at least in part) the same needless finery as the +relatively otiose T. Atkins of Peace. May that despot, whoever he be, +depart to a realm of bliss—I suppose it would be bliss to him—where he +has to do hospital orderlies' chores in an attire completely composed of +tarnishing buttons, every separate one of which must hourly be brought +up to the parade standard of specklessness.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="X" id="X"></a>X</h2> + +<h2>A WORD ABOUT "SLACKERS IN KHAKI"</h2> + + +<p>When the ambulances containing a new batch of wounded begin to roll up +to the entrance of the hospital they are received by a squad of +orderlies. To a spectator who happened to pass at that moment it might +appear that these orderlies had nothing else to do but lift stretchers +out of ambulances and carry them indoors. The squad of orderlies have an +air of always being ready on duty waiting to pounce out on any patient +who may arrive at any hour of the day or night and promptly transfer him +to his bed. I have known of a visitor, witnessing this incident, who +commented on it in a manner which showed that he imagined he had seen +our unit performing its sole function; he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span>pictured us existing purely +and simply for one end—the carrying of stretchers up the front steps +into the building. He was kind enough to praise the rapidity with which +the job was done—but he held it to be a job which hardly justified the +enlistment of so considerable a company of able-bodied males. What, +exactly, we did with ourselves during the long hours when ambulances +were <i>not</i> arriving, he failed to understand. I suppose he pictured us +twiddling our thumbs in some kind of cosy club-room situated in the +neighbourhood of the front door, from whence we could be summoned as +soon as another convoy hove in sight.</p> + +<p>The truth of the matter is quite otherwise. Arrivals of wounded, even +when they occur several times a day (I have known six hundred patients +enter the hospital in forty-eight hours), are far from being our chief +preoccupation. Admittedly they take precedence of other duties. The +message, "Convoy coming! Every man wanted in the main hall!" is the +signal for each member of the unit who is not engaged in certain +exempted sections <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span>to drop his work, whatever it is, and proceed smartly +to report to the sergeant-in-charge. The telephone has notified us of +the hour at which the ambulances may be expected; the hospital's +internal telephone system has passed on the tidings to the various +officials concerned; and, five minutes before the patients are due, all +the orderlies likely to be required must "down tools," so to speak, and +line-up at the door. They come streaming from every corner of the +hospital and of its grounds. Some have been working in wards, some have +been pushing trollies in the corridors, some have been shovelling coke, +some have been toiling in the cookhouse or stores, some have been +shifting loads of bedding to the fumigator, some have been on "sanitary +fatigue," some have been cleaning windows or whitewashing walls, some +have been writing or typing documents, some have been spending their +rest-hour in slumber or over a game of billiards. Whatever they were +doing, they must stop doing it at the word of command.</p> + +<p>If the convoy be a large one, its advent may even mean, for the +orderlies, the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span>dread announcement, "All passes stopped." The luckless +wight whose one afternoon-off in the week this happens to be, and who +has probably arranged to tryst with a lady friend, finds, at the gate, +that he is turned back by the sentry. In vain he displays his pass, +properly signed, stamped and dated: the telephone has warned the sentry +(or "R.M.P."—Regimental Military Policeman) that the passes have been +countermanded. Until the convoy has been dealt with, the pass is so much +waste paper, and the unfortunate orderly's inamorata will look for him +and behold him not. How many painful misunderstandings this "All passes +stopped" law has given rise to, one shudders to guess.</p> + +<p>But indeed no war-hospital orderly ever arranges any appointment without +the proviso that he is liable to break it. The folk who imagine that the +hospital orderly enjoys a "cushy job" (to use the appropriate +vernacular) seldom make sufficient allowance for this painful aspect of +it. The ordinary soldier in training in an English camp has his evenings +free, and certain other free times, which are nearly <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span>as sure as the +sun's rising. The hospital orderly is <i>never</i>—in theory at any +rate—off duty. His free moments are regarded not as a right but as a +favour: no freedom, at any time, can be guaranteed. He is liable to be +called on in the middle of the night, or at the instant when he is going +off duty, or when at a meal, or when resting, or when on the point of +walking out in pursuance of the gentle art of courtship. And he must +respond, instanter, or he will find that he has earned the C.B.—which +in this instance means not Companion of the Bath, but Confined to +Barracks, a punishment as hard to bear as the cruel "keeping in" of our +school-days.</p> + +<p>Without presuming to compare either the importance or the onerousness of +the hospital orderly's work with that of the soldier capable of going to +the front to fight, I would here add that the critic who watches the +stretcher-carrying and thinks it a pity that able-bodied males should be +wasted on it, is doing the system (not to mention the men themselves) an +injustice. For the men whom he sees are <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span>not, as a matter of fact, +able-bodied, even though muscular enough to stand this short physical +effort. Excitable old gentlemen who believe that they can decide at a +glance whether a man is medically fit, and write to the Press about the +"shirkers" they think they have detected, were of the opinion, long +since, that the R.A.M.C. should be combed out. Certain journals made a +great feature of this proposal. Whatever may be the case elsewhere, I +can only say that as far as our unit was concerned it had already, +months before the newspaper agitation, been combed out five times; and +this in spite of the fact that, at the period when I enlisted, our +Colonel declined to look at any recruit who was not either over age or +had been rejected for active service. The unit was thus made up, even +then, of elderly men and of "crocks." (This was before the start of the +Derby Scheme and, of course, considerably before the introduction of +Universal Service.) Perhaps it is allowable to point the moral against +the "shirker"-discovering armchair patriots aforesaid: that no small +proportion of our unit was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span>composed of over-age recruits who, instead +of informing the world at large that they wished they were younger, +"And, by Gad, I envy the lads their chance to do <i>anything</i> in the +country's cause," did not rest until they had found an opening. In my +own hut there were two recruits over sixty years of age. Elsewhere in +the unit there were several over fifty. Our mess-room at meal times was, +and still is, dotted with grey-haired heads, not of retired army men +rejoined, but of men who, previous to the war, had lived comfortable +civilian lives. At a later date, when the few fit men that our +combings-out revealed had gone elsewhere, the unit was kept up to +strength by the drafting-in either of C3 recruits or of soldiers who, +having been at the front and been wounded, or invalided back, were +marked for home duty only. So much for the "slackers in khaki" which one +extra emphatic writer (himself not in khaki, although younger than +several of the orderlies here) professed to discover in the R.A.M.C. +Those "slackers" may be having an easier time of it than the heroes of +France, Gallipoli, Salonika, Egypt <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span>and Mesopotamia. But they are not +having so easy a time as some of their detractors.</p> + +<p>The hospital orderly is not (I think I may assert on his behalf) puffed +up with foolish illusions as to his place in the scheme of things. It is +a humble place, and he knows it. His work is almost comically +unromantic, painfully unpicturesque. Moreover—let us be frank—much of +it is uninteresting, after the first novelty has worn off. Work in the +wards has its compensations: here there is the human element. But only a +portion of a unit such as ours can be detailed for ward work: the rest +are either hewers of wood and drawers of water or else have their noses +to a grindstone of clerical monotonousness beside which the +ledger-keeping of a bank employee is a heaven of blissful excitements. +You will find few hospital orderlies who are not "fed up"; you will find +none who do not long for the war's end. And I fancy you will find very, +very few who would not go on active service if they could. On the +occasions when we have had calls for overseas volunteers, the response +has always ex<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span>ceeded the demand. The people who, looking at a party of +hospital orderlies, remark—it sounds incredible, but there <i>are</i> people +who make the remark—"These fellows should be out at the front," may +further be reminded that "these fellows" now have no say in the choice +of their own whereabouts. Not a soldier in the land can decide where or +how he shall serve. That small matter is not for him, but for the +authorities. He may be thirsting for the gore of Brother Boche, and an +inexorable fate condemns him to scrub the gore of Brother Briton off the +tiles of the operating theatre. He may (but I never met one who did) +elect to sit snugly on a stool at a desk filling-in army forms or +conducting a card index; and lo, at a whisper from some unseen Nabob in +the War Office, he finds himself hooked willy-nilly off his stool and +dumped into the Rifle Brigade. This is what it means to be in khaki, and +it is hardly the place of persons not in khaki to bandy sneers about the +comfortableness of the Linseed Lancers whose initials, when not standing +for Rob All My Comrades, can be inter<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span>preted to mean Run Away, Matron's +Coming. The squad of orderlies unloading that procession of ambulances +at the hospital door may not envy the wounded sufferers whom they +transmit to their wards; but the observer is mistaken if he assumes that +the orderlies have, by some questionable manœuvre, dodged the fiery +ordeal of which this string of slow-moving stretchers is the harvest.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XI" id="XI"></a>XI</h2> + +<h2>THE RECREATION ROOMS</h2> + + +<p>We rather pride ourselves, at the 3rd London, on the fame of our +hospital not merely as a place in which the wounded get well, but as a +place in which they also "have a good time." The two things, truth to +tell, are interlinked—a truism which might seem to need no labouring, +were it not for the evidence brought from more rigid and red-tape-ridden +establishments. A couple of our most valued departments are the "Old +Rec." and the "New Rec."—the old and new recreation rooms. The new +recreation room, a spacious and well-built "hut," contains three +billiard tables, a library, and current newspapers, British and +Colonial. This room is the scene of whist-drives, billiard and pool +tournaments, and other sociable <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span>ongoings. Sometimes there is an +exhibition match on the best billiard table: the local champion of +Wandsworth shows us his skill—and a very pretty touch he has: once the +lady billiard champion of England came, and defeated the best opponent +we could enlist against her—an event which provoked tremendous applause +from a packed congregation of boys in blue.</p> + +<p>The old recreation room is fitted with a permanent stage for theatricals +and concerts. It is also our "Movie Palace." (I think our hospital was +the first to instal a cinematograph as a fixture.) During the morning +the floor area is dotted with miniature billiard tables—which are never +for a moment out of use. In the afternoon these are removed; some +hundreds of chairs replace them; and at 4.30 we begin an +entertainment—music, a play (we have had Shakespeare here), lantern +slides, films, or what not. Those entertainments, which have continued +unbrokenly since the hospital began to function in 1914, constitute the +outstanding feature of the "good time" enjoyed by 3rd Londoners. The +"Old Rec." and its crowded concerts will <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span>be a memory cherished by hosts +of fighting men from the homeland and from overseas.</p> + +<p>In the original hospital plan—drawn up before the war—the Old Rec. +(which is a part of the main school building) was marked down to be a +ward of forty beds. Its structure, its internal geography, and the sheer +impossibility of providing it with the essential sanitary conveniences, +would make it unsuitable to be a ward of four beds, let alone of forty. +On this account its allotment for recreation purposes would be +excusable. But the Old Rec. and the New Rec. too, for that matter, +justify their superficial waste of bed-space on other—and +unanswerable—grounds. It is a mere matter of common sense to arrange +some centre to which the patient can repair and employ his leisure when +he is sufficiently well to potter about though not well enough to be +discharged from hospital. Instead of idling in his ward and disturbing +the patients who are still confined to bed—and who, often, are urgently +in need of quietness—the convalescent departs to one or other of the +recreation rooms, morning and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span>afternoon, where he can make as much +noise as he likes and where he can meet and fraternise with his comrades +from every front. (What exchanging of stories those recreation rooms +have witnessed!) On the one hand, then, the seriously ill patient is not +annoyed by the rovings in the ward of the walking patients; and on the +other the walking patients are not irked by the necessity for keeping +quiet at a period when returning health stimulates them to a wholesome +desire for fun. Both kinds of patients, thus, may legitimately be said +to get better more quickly than they would have had a chance to do were +it not for the recreation rooms. It is within the writer's knowledge +that the medical staff of the hospital, on being consulted as to the +"bed value" of the recreation rooms, unanimously agreed that their +existence reduced the average sojourn of the hospital's inmates by a +definite "per day" ratio: that ratio, so far from showing a bed-space +waste, worked out at a per-annum gain of bed-space equivalent to a +ward—if such a colossal ward could conceived!—of upwards of 300 beds.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> +So much for a point which might not appear to be worth detailed +explanation, but which has here been glanced at in order that critics +(for, unbelievable though it sounds, there have been curmudgeons to +growl of spoiling the wounded by too much pleasure) may be answered in +advance. The recreation rooms are a paying investment both to the +hospital and to the State. This is our trump card in any "spoiling the +wounded" controversy—though I dare say that most of us would not, in +any case, care twopence whether the concerts and films and billiards +were an investment or an extravagance: nothing would stand in the way of +our ambition to provide the now proverbial "good time" for all the +guests of the 3rd London.</p> + +<p>Scores of concerts of an excellence which would have been noteworthy +anywhere have been presented to our assemblages of wounded in the Old +Rec. Singers, musicians, actors and actresses have come and given of +their best. Miss Hullah's Music in War Time Committee (that delightful +body), and Mr. Howard Williams's parties, are perhaps our greatest +regular standbys.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> Certain sections of the public know Mr. Howard +Williams's name as a famous one in other fields of activity: to +thousands of soldiers it is honoured as that of the man who tirelessly +organised scrumptious tea-parties, pierrot shows, exhibition boxing +contests, nigger troupe entertainments—a list of jollifications, +indoors in winter and in the open air in summer, infinite in variety and +guaranteed never once to fall flat. A curious Empire reputation, this of +Mr. Williams!</p> + +<p>Yesterday, for instance, a nigger troupe visited the hospital. To be +exact, they were the Metropolitan Police Minstrels ("By Permission of +Sir E. R. Henry, G.C.V.O., K.C.B., C.S.I., Commissioner"); but no member +of the audience, I imagine, could picture those jocose blackamoors, with +their tambourines and bones, as really being anything so serious as +traffic-controlling constables. That their comic songs were accompanied +by a faultless orchestra was understandable enough. One can believe in a +police band. One is not surprised that the police band is a good band. +To believe that the ebony-visaged person with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span>the huge red +indiarubber-flexible mouth who sings "Under the archway, Archibald," and +follows this amorous ditty with a clog dance is—in his washed +moments—the terror of burglars, requires unthinkable flights of +imagination. As I gazed at this singular resurrection of Moore and +Burgess and breathless childhood's afternoons at the St. James's +Hall—the half circle of inanely alert faces the colour of fresh +polished boots—the preposterous uniforms and expansive +shirt-fronts—the "nigger" dialect which this strange convention demands +but which cannot be said to resemble the speech of any African tribe yet +discovered—I found that by no effort of faith or credulity could I +pierce the disguise and perceive policemen.</p> + +<p>It is at least twenty years since I met a nigger minstrel in the flesh. +Vague ghosts of bygone persons and of piquant anachronisms seemed to +float approvingly in the air: the Prince Consort, bustles, the high +bicycle, sherry, Moody and Sankey, the Crystal Palace, Labouchere, "Pigs +in Clover," Lottie Collins, Evolution, Bimetallism: hosts of forgotten +images, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span>names and shibboleths came popping out from the brain's dusty +pigeon-holes, magically released by the spectacle of the nigger troupe.</p> + +<p>Yes, I was indeed switched into the past by Mr. Bones, Massa Jawns'n and +the rest. And yet the present might have seemed more emphatic and more +poignant. One felt, rather than saw, an audience of several hundred +persons in the dim rows of chairs. And laughing at the broad witticisms +of the niggers, or enjoying their choruses and orchestral +accompaniments, one forgot just what that half-glimpsed audience +consisted of; what it meant, and how it came to be here assembled.</p> + +<p>Of course when the lights were turned up in the interval, one beheld the +usual spectacle: stretchers, wheeled chairs, crutches, bandaged heads, +arms in splints, blind men, men with one arm, men with one leg: rank on +rank of war's flotsam and jetsam, British, Australians, New Zealanders, +Newfoundlanders, Canadians, come to make merry over the minstrels: in +the front row the Colonel and the Matron, with officer patients; here +and there an <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span>orderly or a V.A.D.; here and there a Sister with her +"boys." It was a family gathering. I descried no strangers, and no one +not in uniform—unless you count the men too ill to don their blue +slops: these had been brought in dressing-gowns or wrapped in blankets. +No mere haphazard audience, this, of anybody and everybody who chooses +to pay at a turnstile! Entrance to this hall is free ... but the price +is beyond money, all the same.</p> + +<p>A family party it was, decidedly. Thick fumes of tobacco smoke uprose +from it. (Shall we ever abandon the cigarette habit, now?) Orderlies +continued to arrive and stow themselves discreetly in corners: by some +strange providence each orderly had found that for a while he could be +spared from ward or office. Staff-Sergeants, Sergeants, +Corporals—mysteriously they made time to leave their various +departments. Even a bevy of masseuses (those experts eternally on the +rush from ward to ward) had peeped in to see the nigger minstrels. And +everybody was pleased: every jest and every conundrum got its laugh, +every ballad its applause. Not that we ever<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> "give the bird" to those +who come to amuse us. Offer us skill in any shape or form—pierrots, +niggers, pianist, violinist, conjurer, ventriloquist, dancer, reciter: +any or all of these will be appreciated warmly.</p> + +<p>Yesterday, for the nigger minstrels, there were no empty chairs. Until, +in the midst of Part II ("A Laughable Sketch"—<i>vide</i> the +programme—wherein female rôles were doubly coy by reason of the +masculinity of their falsetto dialogue and remarkable ankles) a +messenger stole hither and thither, whispering to the orderlies, who +promptly tiptoed from the room.</p> + +<p>A convoy of new arrivals demanded our presence.</p> + +<p>The silent ambulances were gliding up to the entrance of the hospital. +Orderlies, fetched from their jobs and from the entertainment, lined up +in the rain to take their places in the quartettes of bearers who lifted +out the stretchers. The Assistant Matron, standing in the shelter of the +door, checked her list; the Medical Officer handed out the ward tickets; +the lady clerks from the Admission and Discharge Office took the +patients' parti<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span>culars. And the bathroom became very busy.</p> + +<p>As I started to wheel a much-bandaged warrior to his ward, the +recreation-room door opened and a burst of music-cum-essence-of-nigger +emerged on his astonished ears. I was a little doubtful as to whether +our new guest would not think his reception somewhat flippant in key. +The poor fellow was visibly suffering, and the sound of tambourines and +comedians' guffaws seemed a scarcely proper comment on his condition. I +might have spared myself these misgivings. "Say, chum," he interrogated +me feebly, "what's that noise?" "Nigger minstrels, old man." +"Golly!—and have I got to go straight to my bed?"</p> + +<p>Alas, he had to. It would be long before he could be well enough to be +taken to one of our entertainments. But, had he been given his way, he +would have gone direct from his fatiguing overseas journey into the Old +Rec. to join the family party and chuckle at Mr. Bones and Massa +Jawns'n.... No doubts assailed <i>his</i> mind as to whether it was right to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> +"waste bed-space" on mere frivolities. A nigger minstrel show was to him +a deal more important, in fact, than his wound. And perhaps, in +instinct, he was not far wrong.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XII" id="XII"></a>XII</h2> + +<h2>THE COCKNEY</h2> + + +<p>Before I enlisted I was lodging in a house which it was occasionally +convenient to approach by a short cut through an area of slumland. One +night when traversing this slum—the hour was 1.30 a.m.—I was stopped +by a couple of women who told me that there was a man lying on the +ground in an adjacent alley; they thought he must be ill; would I come +and look at him?</p> + +<p>They led me down a turning which opened into a narrow court. This court +was reached by an arched tunnel through tenement houses. The tunnel was +pitchy black, but I struck matches as I proceeded, and presently we came +upon the object of my companions' solicitude—a young soldier, propped +against the wall and with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span>his legs projecting across the flagstones. +The women had, in fact, discovered him by tripping over those legs in +the darkness.</p> + +<p>They were slatternly women, but warm-hearted; and when I had managed to +arouse the gentleman in khaki and hoist him to his feet (for the cause +of his indisposition was plain—and he had slept it off) they called +down blessings on my head and overwhelmed our friend with sympathy which +he did not wholly deserve and to which he made no rejoinder. Nor did he +vouchsafe any very lucid answer when I asked him whither he was bound. I +was prepared to pilot him—but I could hardly do so without knowing +towards which point of the compass he proposed to steer, or rather, to +be steered. "I know w'ere I wanter go," was all I could get out of him. +Very well; if he knew his address, it was no concern of mine; he could +lead on; I would act as a mere supporter. In this capacity, with my arm +linked firmly in his, I brought him forth from the tunnel to the street +(he had no wish, it seemed, to go through the tunnel into <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span>the court), +and here we bade farewell to the ladies.</p> + +<p>"Which way now?" I inquired. My charge responded not, but crossed to a +corner and meandered up one of those interminable thoroughfares which +lead out of London into the suburbs. Trudging with him and helping him +to sustain his balance, which was not as stable as could be wished, I +plied him with mildly genial conversation and at last elicited a few +vague answers. These were couched in the cockney idiom, but I caught a +faint nasal twang which led me to suspect that the speaker had come from +the other side of the Atlantic. Yes—he told me he had just arrived from +Canada.</p> + +<p>We had proceeded a short distance when on the further side of the street +I descried a golden halo which outlined the silhouette of a coffee +stall. It occurred to me that a cup of hot coffee would be a good tonic +to disperse the last symptoms of my friend's indiscretion, so I +deflected him across the road, and we brought up, together, alongside +the coffee-stall's counter.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span></p><p>Lest the reader should be unacquainted with that unique creation, the +coffee-stall, I must explain that it is nocturnal in habit, emerging +from its lair only between the hours of 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. It is an +equipage of which the interior is inhabited by a fat, jolly man (at +least according to my experience he is always fat and jolly) surrounded +by steaming urns, plates of cake, buns of a citron-yellow hue, pale +pastries, ham sandwiches and packets of cigarettes. The upper panels of +one of its sides unfold to form a bar below and a penthouse roof above, +the latter being generally extended into an awning. The awning is a +protection for the customer not against the sun—a luminary from whose +assaults the London coffee-stalls have little to fear—but against the +rain. Thanks to these awnings, and the chattiness of the fat, jolly man, +and the warmth exhaled by the urns, and the circumstance that the public +houses are shut, our coffee-stalls are able to sell two brownish +beverages, called respectively coffee and tea, which otherwise could +hardly hope to achieve the honour of human consumption.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span></p><p>Fate has guided me on many midnight pilgrimages through the town, and I +have imbibed, sometimes with relish, the liquids alluded to; I have also +partaken of the pallid pastry and the citron-yellow buns. I am therefore +in a position to write, for the benefit of persons less well informed, a +treatise on coffee-stalls. This I shall refrain from doing. The one +point it is necessary for me to mention is that the fat, jolly man, +being deplorably distrustful, does not supply casual customers with +teaspoons. You may have a cup of alleged tea (one penny) or a cup of +alleged coffee (one penny); a dollop of sugar is dropped into the cup; +the fat, jolly man gives the mixture a stir-round with a teaspoon; then +he places the cup before you on the bar; but the teaspoon is still in +his grasp. I dare say he would lend you the teaspoon if you requested +him to do so; but unless you have that audacity he prefers to keep the +teaspoon on his side of the bar, out of harm's way. This may seem +strange, when you perceive that the teaspoon is fashioned of a metal +unknown to silversmiths and might be priced at threepence.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> But even a +threepenny teaspoon is a souvenir which some collectors would not +despise.</p> + +<p>Presumably regular customers receive teaspoons, for teaspoons lie in a +heap on the fat, jolly man's side of the counter. This was the case at +the coffee-stall before which the young soldier and I ranged ourselves. +And the heap of teaspoons seemed to exercise a curious fascination upon +the soldier. He continued to stare at them for some minutes after I had +set in front of him his cup of coffee. Then he stared at the fat, jolly +man, who was cutting slabs from a loaf. He stared for a long time, +making no reply to my remarks.</p> + +<p>Rain began to patter on the awning—it had rained earlier in the +night—and I became aware of a figure, lurking in the background on the +pavement, beyond the awning's shelter, but within the radius of the haze +of light projected therefrom. It was a wretched, slinking figure, that +of an elderly man with bleared eyes and a red nose: one of those pariahs +who haunt cabstands and promote the cabs up the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span>rank when the front +vehicle is hailed. This special specimen of his breed appeared to be a +satellite of the coffee-stall proprietor: perhaps he helped to tow the +stall to its berth. Whatever might be his function, he lingered on the +outskirts of the ring of light, watching us; and the young soldier, in +his slow scrutiny of the stall and its surroundings, caught sight of +him, and stared stolidly, as he had stared at everything else.</p> + +<p>I was in the act of drinking my coffee when the soldier suddenly leant +across the counter, picked up a spoon, turned, and threw it at the +derelict whose face wavered on the edge of the lamplight's circle. The +victim of this extraordinary attack dodged the missile, then grovelled +after it in the gutter. Meanwhile the fat man (instantaneously ceasing +to be jolly) gave vent to an angry protest.</p> + +<p>"Wotcher do <i>that</i> for? Chuckin' my spoons abart! Drunk, that's wot you +are!"</p> + +<p>"Ain't drunk!" said the soldier.</p> + +<p>"Wotcher chuck my spoon at 'im for, then? 'E ain't done you no 'arm."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span></p><p>"Yus 'e <i>'as</i>," was the soldier's surprising retort.</p> + +<p>"No 'e ain't."</p> + +<p>"Yus 'e <i>'as</i>."</p> + +<p>"No 'e 'ain't. 'E ain't done you no 'arm."</p> + +<p>To which the derelict chimed in (he had retrieved the spoon and now +advanced timidly with it under the awning): "I ain't done <i>you</i> no +'arm"—a husky, whimpering chorus to his fat patron.</p> + +<p>The soldier fixed the derelict with a fierce glare. "Yus you <i>'ave</i>," he +reiterated.</p> + +<p>I was wondering how the dispute might develop, but evidently my ear is +unattuned to the nuances of these dialectics. The soldier's glare and +the soldier's tone must have betrayed themselves to the two other men as +factitious; the derelict, anyhow, lost his nervousness and, approaching +nearer, scanned the soldier with dim, peering eyes; then broke into a +joyous grin and exclaimed:</p> + +<p>"Lumme, if it ain't ol' Bert!"</p> + +<p>And the fat man, leaning on his counter, and likewise examining the +soldier, cried, "Ol' Bert it is!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span></p><p>"Knew you in two ticks," grunted Bert. "Same ol' 'Arry." (This was the +derelict.) "Same ol' 'Erb." (This was the fat—and once again +jolly—man.)</p> + +<p>Explanations ensued. Bert, the young soldier, was a native of these +parts. He had emigrated to Canada five years previously. To-night, <i>en +route</i> for the front, he had returned. Earlier in the evening there had +been ill-advised libations; he had started for his home, felt sleepy, +sheltered from the wet in a tunnel quite familiar to him, and there been +discovered by the ladies and roused by myself. Arrived at the +coffee-stall he had recognised in its proprietor a former pal and +another former pal in 'Arry the derelict. To throw the spoon at 'Arry +was merely his playful mode of announcing his identity.</p> + +<p>I left the trio reviewing the past and exchanging news of the present. +My services, it was clear, would no longer be required by the prodigal. +He and his mates gave me a hearty good-night.</p> + +<p>I did not guess how intimate was soon to be my association with the +Berts and 'Arries and 'Erbs of the world. I was to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span>be their servant, to +wait upon them, to perform menial tasks for them, to wash them and dress +them and undress them, to carry them in my arms. I was to see them +suffer and to learn to respect their gameness, and the wry, "grousing" +humour which is their almost universal trait. In my own wards, and +elsewhere in the hospital, I came in close contact with many cockneys of +the slums. Even when one had not precisely "placed" a patient of this +description, the relatives who came to him on visiting days gave the +clue to the stock from which he sprang. The mother was sometimes a +"flower girl"; the sweetheart, with a very feathered hat, and hair which +evidently lived in curling pins except on great occasions, probably +worked in a factory. These people, if the patient were confined to bed, +sat beside him and talked in a subdued, throaty whisper. But I have seen +the same sort of patient, well enough to walk about, meet his folks on +visiting afternoons at the hospital gate. There is a crowd at the +hospital gate, passing in and going out; hosts of patients are waiting, +some <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span>in wheeled chairs and some seated on the iron fence which fringes +the drive. The reunions which occur at that gate are exceedingly public. +Our East Ender is perhaps accustomed to publicity; his slum does not +conceal its feelings—it quarrels, and makes love, without drawn blinds, +and privacy is not an essential of its ardours. Be that as it may, these +meetings at the hospital gate, which are not lacking in pathos, have +sometimes manifested a tear-compelling comicality when the actors in the +drama belonged to the class which produced Bert.</p> + +<p>In a higher class there is restraint and a rather stupid bashfulness. I +have seen a wounded youngster flush apprehensively and only peck his +mother in return for her sobbing embrace. That is not Bert's way. He +knows—he is not a fool—that his mother looks a trifle absurd as, with +bonnet awry, she surges perspiringly past the sentries, the tails of her +skirt dragging in the dust and her feet flattened with the weight of +over-clad, unwholesome obesity they have to bear. But he hobbles sprily +to meet her, and his salute is no mere <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span>peck, but a smacking kiss, so +noisy that it makes everyone laugh. He laughs too—perhaps he did it on +purpose to raise a laugh: that is his quaint method; but the fact +remains that, whatever his motive, he has managed to please his mother. +She is sniffing loudly yet laughing also, and one could want no better +picture of human affection than this of Bermondsey Bert and his +shapeless, work-distorted, maybe bibulous-looking mother, exchanging +that resounding and ungraceful kiss at the hospital gate. I have heard +Bert shout "Mother!" from a hundred yards off, when he spied her coming +through the gate. No false shame there! No smug "good form" in that—nor +in the time-honoured jest which follows: "And 'ave you remembered to +bring me a bottle of beer, mother?" (Of course visitors are not allowed +to introduce alcohol into the hospital—otherwise I am afraid there is +no doubt that mother would have obliged.)</p> + +<p>In one of our wards we harboured, for a while, a costermonger. This +coster, an entertaining and plucky creature who had <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span>to have a leg +amputated, received no callers on visiting day: his own relatives were +dead and he and his wife had separated. "Couldn't 'it it orf," he +explained, and with laudable impartiality added, "Married beneath 'er, +she did, w'en she married me." As the lady was herself a coster, it was +plain that here, as in other grades of society, there are degrees, +conventions and barriers which may not be lightly overstepped. "Sister," +however, thought that the patient should inform his wife that he had +lost his leg, and prevailed on him to send her a letter to that effect. +A few days later he was asked,</p> + +<p>"Well, did you write and tell your wife you had lost a leg?"</p> + +<p>"Yus."</p> + +<p>"I suppose she's answered? What has she said?"</p> + +<p>"Said 'm a liar!"</p> + +<p>Her retort had neither disconcerted nor offended him. He was a +philosopher—and, like so many of his kind, a laughing philosopher. When +he was sufficiently recovered from his operation to get about on +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span>crutches he was the wag of the ward. He took a special delight in those +practical jokes which are invented by patients to tease the nurses, and +devoted the most painstaking ingenuity to their preparation. It was he +who found a small hole in the lath-and-plaster wall which separates the +ward from the ward's kitchen. Through this hole a length of cotton was +passed and tied to the handle of a mug on the kitchen shelf. At this +period, owing to the Zeppelin raids, only the barest minimum of light +was allowed, and the night nurse, when she entered the kitchen, went +into almost complete darkness. No sooner was she in the kitchen and +fumbling for what she required than a faint noise—that of the cup being +twitched by the cotton leading to the mischievous coster's bed—arose on +the shelf and convinced her that she was in the presence of a mouse. She +retreated, and perhaps if any convalescent patient had been awake she +would have enlisted his aid to expel the mouse; but in the ward the +patients were, as one man, snoring vociferously. It was this slightly +overdone snoring, at the finish, which gave <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span>birth to suspicions and +caused the trick to be detected.</p> + +<p>The night nurses do not have a placid time of it if their patients are +at the stage of recovery when spirits begin to rise and the early +slumber-hour which the hospital rules prescribe is not welcome. +String-actuated knaveries, more or less similar to the +mouse-in-the-kitchen one, are always devised for the plaguing of a new +night nurse. Sometimes in the dead of night, when utter silence broods +over the ward, the gramophone will abruptly burst into raucous music: +its mechanism has been released by a contrivance which gives no clue to +the crime's perpetrator. The flustered nurse gropes her way down the +ward and stops the gramophone, every patient meanwhile sitting up in bed +and protesting against her cruelty in having awakened them by starting +it. Half an hour after the ward has quietened, the other gramophone +(some wards own two) whirrs off into impudent song: it also has been +primed. Nurse is wiser on future occasions: she stows the gramophones, +when she comes on duty, where no one <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span>can tamper with them. Even so, she +may have her nerves preyed upon by eerie tinklings, impossible to locate +in the darkness; these are caused by two knives, hung from a nail fixed +high up in the rafters. By jiggling a string, which is conducted over +another rafter and down the wall to his pillow, the patient makes the +knifeblades clash. Sometimes two strings, leading to different beds, +complete this instrument of torture. After a determined search, nurse +finds one string, and, having cut it, flatters herself that she has got +the better of her enemies. Not a bit of it. She has scarcely settled in +her chair again before the tinklings recommence. The second string is in +action; and as she hunts about the ward for the source of the melody in +the ceiling, muffled convulsions of mirth, from the dim rows of beds, +furnish evidence that her naughty charges are not getting the repose +which they require and to ensure which is part of the purpose of her +presence.</p> + +<p>A nurse who happens to be unpopular never has these pranks played upon +her.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> They are in the nature of a compliment. Nor do they occur in a +ward where there is a patient seriously ill. It is impossible to imagine +war-hospital patients acting inconsiderately towards a distressed +comrade. This observation renders all the more amusing the scandalised +concern which I once beheld on the demure physiognomy of a visiting +clergyman when he gathered the drift of certain allusions to a case on +the Danger List.</p> + +<p>The name of the Danger List explains itself. When a patient is put on +the Danger List, his relatives are sent for and may be with him whether +it is the visiting afternoon or not. (If they come from the provinces +they are presented with a railway pass and, if poor, are allotted +lodgings near the hospital, a grant being made to them from our +Benevolent Fund.) For the information of the V.A.D.'s who answer +visitors' questions in the Enquiry Bureau at the main entrance to the +hospital, a copy of the Danger List hangs there, and it is on record +that an awestruck child, seeing this column of patients' names, and +reading the heading, asked, "What does 'Danger<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> List' mean? Does it mean +that it's dangerous to go near them?" Now in Ward C 22 a patient, a +cockney, was on the Danger List—which circumstance availed nothing to +depress his spirits. In spite of considerable pain, he poked fun at the +prospect of his own imminent demise, and was himself the chief offender +against the edict of quietness which "Sister" had issued for her ward. +He <i>would</i> talk; and he <i>would</i> talk about undertakers, post-mortems, +epitaphs and the details of a military funeral. "That there top note of +the Last Post on the bugle doesn't 'arf sound proper," he said—a +verdict which anyone who has heard this beautiful and inspired fanfare, +which is the farewell above a soldier's grave, and which ends on a +soaring treble, will endorse. "But," he went on, "if the bugler's 'ad a +drop o' somethin' warm on the way to the cemetery, that there top note +always reminds me of a 'iccup. An' if 'e 'iccups over me, I shall wanter +spit in 'is eye, blimey if I won't."</p> + +<p>This persiflage had been going on for a couple of days and getting to be +more and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span>more elaborate and allusive, infecting the entire ward, so +that the fact that the man was on the Danger List had become a kind of +catchword amongst his fellows. Entered, in all innocence, the clergyman. +("The very bloke to put me up to all the tricks!"—from the irreverent +one.) At the same moment a walking patient, also a cockney, who had been +reading a newspaper, gave vent to a cry of feigned horror. "Boys!" he +announced, "it says 'ere there's a shortage of timber!"</p> + +<p>Guffaws greeted this sally. Everyone saw the innuendo at once—everyone +except the clergyman, and when he grasped the point, that Ol' Chum +So-and-So was on the Danger List and a shortage of timber was supposed +to imply that he might be done out of a coffin, he was visibly shocked. +Perhaps he did not understand cockney humour.... However, one may add +that our irrepressible friend, at the moment of writing, is off the +Danger List (albeit only after a protracted struggle with the Enemy at +whom he jeered), and is now contriving to be as funny about <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span>life as he +was funny—and fearless—about Death.</p> + +<p>I caught sight to-day of another cockney acquaintance of mine, whose +Christian name is Bill, trundling himself down the hospital drive in a +wheeled chair. Perched on the knee of his one leg, with its feet planted +on the stump which is all that is left of the other, was his child, aged +four. Beside him walked his wife, resplendent in a magenta blouse and a +hat with green and pink plumes.</p> + +<p>The trio looked happy, and Mrs. Bill's gala attire was symbolical. When +Bill was in my ward he too was on the Danger List. I remember that when +he first came to us, before his operation, and before he took a turn for +the worse, his wife visited him in that same magenta blouse (or another +equally startling) and that for some reason she and "Sister" did not +quite hit it off, "had words," and subsequently for a period were not on +speaking terms. Later, when Bill underwent his operation, and began to +sink, his bed was moved out on to the ward's verandah. Here his wife +(now wearing a subdued <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span>blouse) sat beside him, hour after hour, while +little Bill, the child, towed a cheap wooden engine up and down the +grass patch, oblivious to the ordeal through which his parents were +passing. It was my business, as orderly, to intrude at intervals upon +the scene on the verandah, to bring Bill such food as he was able to +tolerate. On the first occasion, after Bill's collapse, that I prepared +to take him a cup of tea, Sister stopped me. "Don't forget to take tea, +and some bread and butter, to that poor woman. She looks tired. And some +milk for the child." "Very good, Sister." I cut bread-and-butter, and +filled an extra mug of tea. "Orderly! What are you doing?" Sister had +reappeared. And I was rebuked because I was going to offer Mrs. Bill her +tea in a tin mug (the patients all have tin mugs) and had cut her +bread-and-butter too thick. I must cut dainty slices of thin +bread-and-butter, use Sister's own china ware, and serve the whole +spread on a tray with a cloth. All of which was typical of Sister, who +from that day treated Bill's wife with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span>true tenderness; and Bill's wife +became one of Sister's most enthusiastic adorers.</p> + +<p>It came to pass, after a week of pitiful anxiety, that the Medical +Officer pronounced Bill safe once more. "Bloke says I'm not goin' ter +peg art," he told me. I congratulated him and remarked that his wife +would be thankful when he met her, on her arrival, with such splendid +news. "I'll 'ave the larf of my missus," said Bill. "W'en she comes, I +shall tell 'er I've some serious noos for 'er, and she's ter send the +kid darn on the grarse ter play. Then I'll pull a long fice and hask 'er +ter bear up, and say I'm sorry for 'er, and she mustn't tike it too +rough, and all that; and she 'as my sympathy in 'er diserpointment: <i>she +ain't ter get 'er widow's pension arter all!</i>"</p> + +<p>I believe that this programme was carried through, more or less to the +letter. Certain it is that I myself overheard another of Bill's grim +pleasantries. He was explaining to madame that they must apprentice +their offspring to the engineering trade. "I wanter mike<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> Lil' Bill a +mowter chap, so's 'e can oil the ball-bearings of me fancy leg wot I'm +ter get at Roehampton." The "fancy leg" ended by being the favourite +theme of Bill's disgraceful extravaganzas. He would announce to Sister, +when she was dressing his stump, that he had been studying means of +earning his living in the future, and had decided to become a professor +of roller skating. He would loudly tell his wife that she would never +again be able to summons him for assault by kicking: the fancy leg would +not give the real one sufficient purchase for an effective kick. And she +was not to complain, in future, about his cold feet against her back in +bed: there would be only one cold foot, the other would be unhitched and +on the floor. And of course there were endless jokes about what had been +done with the amputated leg, whether it had got a tombstone, and so +forth: some of the suggestions going a trifle beyond what good taste, in +more fastidious coteries, would have thought permissible. But Bill had +his own ideas of the humorous, and maybe <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span>his own no less definite ideas +of dignity. In this latter virtue I counted the fact that although once +or twice, when he was very low, he gave way to a little fretting to me, +he never, I am convinced, let fall one querulous word in the presence of +his wife. She sat by her husband's side, and when things were at their +worst the two said naught. The wife numbly watched her Bill's face, +turning now and then to glance at the activities of little Bill with his +engine, or to smile her thanks to the patients who sometimes came and +gave the child pickaback rides. When I intruded, I knew I was +interrupting the communings of a loving and happily married pair; and +the "slangings" of each other which signalised Bill's recovery and his +wife's relief, did nothing to shake my certitude that, like many slum +dwellers, they owned a mutual esteem which other couples, of superior +station, might envy.</p> + +<p>Personally I have never known a cockney patient who did not evoke +affection; and as a matter of curiosity I have been asking a number of +Sisters whether they liked <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span>to have cockneys in their wards. Without a +single exception (and let me say that Sisters are both observant and +critical) the answers have been enthusiastically in the affirmative.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XIII" id="XIII"></a>XIII</h2> + +<h2>THE STATION PARTY</h2> + + +<p>An earnest shopman not long ago tried to sell me a pair of +marching-boots, "for use"—as he explained, lest their name should have +misled me—"on the march." Had he said "for use after the war" he might +have been more persuasive. When I told him that marching-boots were no +good to me, it was manifestly difficult for him to conceal his opinion +that, if so, I had no business to flaunt the garb of Thomas Atkins. When +I added that if he could offer me a pair of running-shoes I might +entertain the proposition, his look was a reproach to irreverent +facetiousness.</p> + +<p>A grateful country has presented me with one pair of excellent +marching-boots. But a hospital ward is no place in which to go clumping +about in footgear designed <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span>to stand hard wear and tear on the +high-roads; and my army boots, after two years, have not yet needed +re-soling. I wore them, it is true, during my period of service with the +Chain Gang, as a squad of outdoor orderlies, engaged in road-making, was +locally called. And I wear them when we have a "C.O.'s Parade"—an +occasion on which naught but officially-provided attire is allowable. It +would take a century of C.O.'s parades, however, to damage boots put on +five minutes before the event and taken off five minutes after: the +parade itself necessitating no sturdier pedestrianism than is involved +in walking less than a hundred yards to the ground and there standing +stock-still at attention.</p> + +<p>I do not say that hospital orderlies never go for a march: only that +marching bulks relatively so small in our programme that any special +equipment for the purpose sounds a little ironical. The issue of +ward-shoes, now, was a real boon. Not that all the pairs with which our +unit was suddenly flooded by the authorities proved as silent as they +were intended to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span>be. Some of them squeaked; and the peregrinations of +the orderly thus afflicted were perhaps more vexatious to the ear of a +nervous patient at night than even the clatter of honest hobnails. And +the soles were thin. A pair of ward-shoes lasted me on the average one +month. If only worn within the ward they might have lasted +longer—though not so very much longer. According to regulations, you +were not allowed to wear ward-shoes except within the confines of the +ward. No doubt it was expected that every time you were sent on an +errand outside the ward you would solemnly take off your ward-shoes and +put on your marching-boots—then, on the return, take off your +marching-boots and put on your ward-shoes—but life as a nursing orderly +is too short for such elaborations of etiquette. It was nothing unusual, +when one was working in a ward which lay at a distance of quarter of a +mile from the hospital's main building, to be sent to the said main +building a dozen times in a single morning. This incessant +message-bearing had to be done, if not at the double, at any rate at +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span>nothing slower than five miles per hour in the morning (the busy time); +in the afternoon a speed of four miles per hour might sometimes be +permissible. At all events, running-shoes, as I told the shopman, would +not have been inappropriate during certain periods of crisis.</p> + +<p>From time to time our tasks were interrupted by the notes of a bugle—or +the shrilling of the Sergeant-Major's whistle—demanding our presence +for an intake of new patients. A party of orderlies was wanted to go to +the railway-station to help to remove stretcher-cases from the ambulance +train. The station lies at a distance of a mile from the hospital, and +this small pilgrimage, achieved a few score times, is practically all I +know of the veritable employment of marching-boots.</p> + +<p>I regretted when a change of plans diverted the ambulance trains to the +central termini for evacuation. The interlude of a station-party trip +was far from unwelcome. Lined up on the parade ground we were put in +charge of a corporal. "Party, 'shun! Right turn! Quick <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span>march!" Off we +trudged, round the back of the hospital, down the drive, out past the +sentry and away along the road. Presently, "Party, march at ease!" +Cigarettes were lit, talking was allowed, and someone would raise a +tune. How pleasant it is to march to singing! To march to a +drum-and-fife band must be wonderful. Or a brass band—! Those joys will +never be mine. Almost all the marching I shall have done in the great +war will be summed up in these tiny promenades from the hospital to the +railway-station, their rhythm sustained by self-raised choruses, none +too melodious.</p> + +<p>Occasionally an officer would be descried, on the pavement. Then "Party, +'shun!" Cigarettes were concealed. The song died. "Eyes left! ... Eyes +front! Party, march at ease!" The cigarettes reappeared, the song was +resumed. Approaching the station, "Party, 'shun!" Cigarettes were thrown +away. Here, in the chief street, we must make a smart show. A crowd is +gathered round the station gate, attracted by the array of Red Cross +vehicles within. Police are keeping back <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span>the curious. The way is +cleared for our arrival. "Left wheel!" Now is our one moment of glory. +We swing round, through the lane of gaping sightseers, and tramp-tramp +in style across the station yard and under the archway, flattering +ourselves (perhaps not without justification) that there are spectators +whose eyes pursue us with secret envy at the serious import of our task.</p> + +<p>The station platform, when we reached it, was generally a blank +perspective devoid of all living creatures except ourselves. Fate +decreed that we should be summoned long before the train was due. I have +kicked my heels for many a doleful hour on that platform, and the +reflection that "they also serve who only stand and wait" was chilly +comfort if—as frequently happened—we had been hurried off dinnerless. +The convoys' arrivals always seemed to coincide with dinner-time. On our +return to the hospital we should find that the rations had been kept hot +for us. But, in the meanwhile, an empty stomach was a poor preparation +for the strain of carrying stretchers up the stairs from the station +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span>platform to the ambulances; and those of us who could produce pennies +for automatic-machine chocolate gained an instant popularity. The +longest period of waiting drew to an end at last, however. The platform +assumed a livelier air. The station-master appeared from his den. +Officers of the Army Medical Service and the Red Cross strolled down. +And the stairs and platform echoed to the pattering of the feet of hosts +of industrious "Bluebottles," fetching stretchers and blankets.</p> + +<p>The blue-uniformed volunteers who form a portion of the London Ambulance +Column are nicknamed the Bluebottles in allusion to their dress. It is a +nickname which, let me say at once, any man might be proud of. I know +not whether the history of the Bluebottles has yet been written, but +certain it is that their doings have got into newspaper print less often +than they deserved. For theirs is a double rôle which truly merits the +country's admiration. While carrying on the commerce of the Empire—that +vital commerce without which there would be bankruptcy <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span>and no sinews of +war, nor indeed any England left to defend—they have vowed themselves +also, of their own free-will, to the helping of the wounded. Day or +night the Bluebottle is liable to be called from his desk or his home by +the telephone: like the Florentine Brother of the Misericordia he must +instantly hurry into his uniform and rush to the place appointed. He may +be busy or he may be tired; no matter: his vow holds good. Off he goes, +to the railway-station to meet the hospital train and evacuate its +stretchers.</p> + +<p>Myself, I have the deepest respect for the Bluebottles and for their +energy in a cause which must often be not only fatiguing, but, from a +commercial point of view, extremely inconvenient. It would be absurd to +pretend, nevertheless, that the less responsible khaki-wearing R.A.M.C. +do not cherish a mild contempt for all Bluebottles. There is no reason +for that contempt. It is idiotic, childish—a humiliating exhibition of +the silliness of masculine human nature. Members of our station-party +who had enlisted but a week back, and who knew nothing whatever of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span>their work, would, in a whisper, mock the Bluebottles—although every +Bluebottle had taken first-aid classes and passed examinations at which +most of the mockers would have boggled. The Bluebottles were "civilians" +... there you have it. We—who would probably never do any battlefield +soldiering in our lives—looked down on all civilians who had the +impudence to wear a uniform of any sort. Such is the behaviour of the +sterner sex at a moment when its sole thought should be of sensible and +efficient co-operation in the performance of duty.</p> + +<p>For of course it was our duty to co-operate with the Bluebottles. The +theory with which we beguiled ourselves, that the Bluebottles were +physically starvelings and required our Herculean aid to lift the +stretchers up the stairs, was palpably nonsense. Still we told ourselves +that we, as disciplined soldiers, were here to give a hand to a civilian +mob who might otherwise faint and fail. A singular delusion! Time has +proved its falsity, for with the issue of fresh orders our +station-parties ceased to function: the Bluebottles <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span>now make shift +without us—and without, as far as I know, any mishap.</p> + +<p>The hospital train was eventually signalled. We were ranked, at +attention, at the foot of the stairs. The Bluebottles stood by their +stretchers. There was hurrying hither and thither of officials. +Sometimes our Colonel, having motored from the hospital, appeared on the +platform to see that all was well, and you may be sure that we +endeavoured to look alert in his august presence. And finally the train +glided into the station.</p> + +<p>The hospital trains seemed to be never twice the same: South Westerns, +North Westerns, Great Northerns, Midlands, Great Centrals, Lancashire +and Yorkshires—I saw them all, at one time or another, their sole +affinity being the staring red crosses painted on each coach. A coach or +two consisted of ordinary compartments, for sitting-up cases; the rest +were vans the interiors of which had been converted into wards by means +of bunks. Access to each van-ward was gained by a wide pair of sliding +doors in its centre. These doors, when the train had come to a +standstill, were <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span>opened by pallid-looking orderlies, who lowered +gangways and then gazed forth at us, while they awaited orders, with the +lack-lustre eyes of men who had been deprived of the proper allowance of +sleep.</p> + +<p>As soon as the list of the Medical Officer on the train had been checked +with that of the Medical Officer on the platform, the evacuation began. +Walking-cases were sent off first—generally a tatterdemalion crew, +hobbling and shuffling along the platform, and, at one stage of the war, +with trench mud still clinging to their clothes. They seldom needed our +assistance: the Bluebottles (even if feeble folk) were deemed by our +corporal to be fit to give any weak walking patient an arm, or carry his +kit. The walking patients, in fact, were a mere episode. Motor-cars +whirled them off, five or six at a time, and they might be half through +the process of being bathed at the hospital before the last +stretcher-case was quit of the train. The stretcher cases were our +concern. Pairs of Bluebottles, each carrying a stretcher, entered the +van-wards and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span>anon reappeared with their burden. Now came our cue to +act. As the stretcher approached the foot of the stair two of our number +stepped forth from the rank, each taking a handle from a Bluebottle; the +stretcher thus proceeded on its course up the stair carried by four men, +one on each handle—two Bluebottles and two R.A.M.C.'s.</p> + +<p>That flight of iron stairs from the platform to the road seemed no very +arduous ordeal for the first half-dozen journeys. There was a knack +about keeping the stretcher horizontal: the front bearers must hold +their handles as low as possible; the rear bearers must hoist their +handles shoulder-high. It was all plain sailing and perfectly easy. Four +men to a stretcher is luxurious. At least it is luxurious on the level, +and if you have not far to go and not many consecutive stretchers to +carry. But when the convoy was a large one, when the bearers were too +few and you had no sooner got rid of one stretcher than you must run +down the stairs and, without regaining your breath, grab the handle of +another and slowly toil <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span>up again to the ambulances ... yes, even on the +coldest day it was possible to be moist with perspiration; and as for +the hot weather of the 1915 summer, when one of our Big Pushes was +afoot, or when returned prisoners came from Germany (those were +memorable occasions!)—you might be pardoned a certain aching in the +arm-muscles.</p> + +<p>It was on one of these busy days that I discovered that the comical +prejudice of khaki against the Bluebottles was not (as I had hitherto +supposed) confined to the young swashbucklers of the home-staying +R.A.M.C. It was seldom our custom to enter the hospital trains. An +unwritten law decreed that Bluebottles only should enter the train: the +R.A.M.C. limited themselves to carrying work outside, on the platform +and stair. But on this occasion the supply of Bluebottles had, for the +moment, run short, and our party took a turn at going up the gangways +and evacuating the van-wards. As it happened, I and my mate on the +stretcher were the first khaki-wearers to invade that particular +van-ward. And as we steered <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span>our stretcher in at the door and down the +aisle of cots a shout arose from the wounded lying there: "Here are some +real soldiers!"</p> + +<p>It was too bad. It was base ingratitude to the devoted band of +Bluebottles who had, up till that instant, been toiling at the +evacuation of the ward—and who, as I chanced to know, had been up all +the previous night, carrying stretchers at Paddington and Charing Cross, +while <i>we</i> slept cosily. But—well, there it was. "Here are some real +soldiers!" Khaki greeted khaki—simultaneously spurning the mere +amateur, the civilian. I could have blushed for the injustice of that +naïve cry. But it would be dishonest not to confess that there was +something gratifying about it too. It was the cry of the Army, always +loyal to the Army. These heroic bundles of bandages, lifting wild and +unshaven faces from their pillows, hailed <i>me</i> (a wretched creature who +had never heard a gun go off) as one of their comrades! My mate and I, +as we adjusted our stretcher at a cot's side, and braced ourselves +against the weight of the patient, winked covertly <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span>at one another. "A +nasty one for the Bluebottles!" he said. And it was.</p> + +<p>All the same I seize this opportunity of offering my homage to the +Bluebottles. They have done—are still doing—their bit, and that right +nobly. Thousands of British soldiers have cause to bless them and also +to be thankful for the existence of that great voluntary institution, +the London Ambulance Column.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>When at last the train had been emptied and the ultimate stretcher was +<i>en route</i> for the hospital, our party gathered once more at the top of +the stair, lined up, and was glanced-over by the corporal lest any man +had seized the opportunity to play truant. There were occasions when +some thirsty soul, chafing at the rigours of the strict teetotalism +enforced by our rules, was found to have vanished in the hurly-burly: +his destination, the up-platform refreshment-bar, being readily +surmisable. He had cause to regret his lapse if it were noticed before +he slipped back unostentatiously into our ranks. Then, "Party,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> 'shun! +Left turn! Right incline—quick march!" Off we swung, out into the +streets—cheered by the urchins who still hovered round the gate—and +so, at the rapidest possible pace, home to dinner and a smoke: these (in +my case at any rate) being preceded by the thankful relinquishment of my +seldom-worn and therefore none too friendly marching-boots.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XIV" id="XIV"></a>XIV</h2> + +<h2>SLANG IN A WAR HOSPITAL</h2> + + +<p>Every ward in the hospital has a bathroom attached to it, but in +addition to these there are two large bathrooms, each containing a +number of baths, which are used by walking patients and also by the +orderlies. The more recently built of these bathrooms is divided into +private cubicles. In the older one the baths are on a more sociable +plan, with no partition walls sundering them. The spectacle, in the +"old" bathroom, when a convoy of walking cases has arrived, is one which +should appeal to a painter. Clouds of steam fill the air, and through +the fog you perceive a fine mêlée of figures, some half dressed, some +statuesquely nude, towelling themselves or preparing to wash, or shaving +at bits of mirror propped on the window-sills. Pink <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span>bodies wallow +voluptuously in the deep porcelain-ware tubs, which are of the shape and +superb dimensions of Egyptian sarcophagi. Sometimes a patient with a +wounded arm, unable to help himself, is being soaped and sponged by an +orderly; or you may see a cheerful soul, with an injured foot, balanced +on the rim of the bath and giving himself all the ablutions which are +practicable without the disturbance of bandages. No one who has +frequented our bathrooms would ever doubt that the British Army loves +cleanliness and hot water. Of cold water I cannot speak with the same +enthusiasm.</p> + +<p>A newly-arrived convoy of course monopolises the bathroom; but +throughout the whole day, at almost any hour, you will find a patient or +two here; for by the rule of the hospital it is allowable for any +patient—once he has been given permission to take an unsupervised bath +at all—to take a bath whenever he likes. Consequently it happens often +that half a dozen orderlies may be bathing at the same time as half a +dozen patients—and it need not be added that the occasion is one for +pleasant chats and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span>the barter of anecdotes. For this reason, if for no +other, I always elected to use the "old" bathroom: the "new" one, with +its closed cubicles, was less fruitful in conversations.</p> + +<p>The "old" bathroom was the exchange (and perhaps the starting-point) of +many of our hospital rumours. I imagine that every war hospital is a +hotbed of rumours. Ours certainly was, and is. Amongst the orderlies +there are incessant rumours about promotions, about the chances of the +unit being sent abroad, about surprise inspections, about the imminent +arrival of impossibly large convoys, about news—received privately by +the Colonel over the telephone—of defeats or victories. Nine times out +of ten the rumour turns out to be groundless. But this does not cause +the output of rumours to diminish. Apparently the army is a prolific +soil for rumours, inasmuch as they have a special name: a rumour is +called a <i>buzz</i>. "Only a buzz" ("it's only a rumour") is an expression +often heard on the lips of soldiers. In India it is sometimes "a bazaar +buzz" (a rumour circulating in <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span>the bazaars); here it is, naturally, a +bathroom buzz.</p> + +<p>Many were the choice examples of slang and of colloquialisms which I +culled in the bathroom, sitting comfortably in my bath and communing +with my neighbour in the next bath. I remember one morning making the +acquaintance of an Australian who had recently recovered from a bad +attack of trench feet. Four of the toes of one foot were missing, and +the fifth looked far from sound. My friend was examining this lonely toe +with a critical gaze, and I sympathised with him over its condition. +"Ah!" he said, "that toe is a king to what it was." He went on to tell +me (what I could well believe) that to get your "plates of meat" +frostbitten wasn't such a "cushy wound" as it was cracked up to be by +those who had never experienced its sufferings. "When I went sick the +doctor thought he'd rumbled me swinging the lead. But as soon as he +spotted them there toes of mine—the ones that's gone—I could see he +knew I'd clicked a packet, square dinkum, this trip." ("Square dinkum" +or "dinkum" is an Antipodean verbal flourish, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span>which broadly +approximates to the American "Sure enough" or the English "Not 'arf.")</p> + +<p>Certain of these neologisms are common enough in civilian life—have +been imported into the army since 1914—but others (and the more +interesting ones, as I hold) were, until the war, limited to the +barrack-room. British regiments which had been abroad used an argot of +considerable antiquity, some of it of Oriental origin (<i>e.g.</i> "blighty," +meaning "home": hence "a blighty wound," or simply "a blighty," an +injury sufficiently serious to cause the victim to be invalided to +England). Whether the derivations of army slang have been investigated I +do not know. It appears to me to be a subject worth examination. I am +not myself a philologist, but in the bathrooms and elsewhere in the +hospital I have heard and noted a small collection of slang phrases and +idioms, and these may be worth recording. Such expressions as "swinging +the lead" (malingering or deceiving or acting in a hypocritical manner +or getting the better of anyone) have lost their novelty. So has +"rumbled," which means to be dis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span>covered or detected or found out. These +words have now spread far beyond the confines of the army. And indeed +the rapidity with which all slang and all catch-phrases can be +disseminated offers a rather alarming prospect. For whereas, before the +war, slang at its silliest was often quite local, nowadays its +restriction within given localities has in the nature of things become +impossible. A war hospital such as ours contains inmates from every +county in Britain, as well as from every colony. The same intermingling +occurs on an infinitely greater scale in training-camps and at the +various fronts. All these centres are hotbeds of slang: the men go home +from them, carrying to their native places slang which would never, in +ordinary times, have penetrated there. In the army you will hear a +Scotchman doing what he never did before—dropping his aitches. He has +caught it from his English comrades. You will hear him say "Not +'arf"—an inane tag which, despite its popularity in London, failed to +find any foothold north of the Tweed before the war. "Not 'arf" was +mouthed by Sassenach comedians on the music-hall <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span>stages of Edinburgh +and Glasgow, and was grinned at for what it was worth: the streets did +not adopt it. Now the streets will hear it and will use it: it is one of +Jock's souvenirs from his campaign.</p> + +<p>I am afraid that another triviality which has hitherto been to the taste +only of the south of England is fated to "catch on," by means of the +same missionaries, from Land's End to John o' Groat's, and even in the +colonies. Rhyming slang is extraordinarily common in the army, so common +that it is used with complete unconsciousness as being correct +conversational English. My friend of the king-like toe spoke of his feet +as "plates of meat"—and this though he was an Australian, not a +cockney. If he had had occasion to allude to his leg he would probably +have called it "Scotch peg." A man's arm is his "false alarm"; his nose, +"I suppose"; his eye, "mince pie"; his hand, "German band"; his boot, +"daisy root"; his face "chevvy chase"; and so forth—an interminable +list. What exactly was the <i>raison d'être</i> of this pseudo-poetic mania I +do not know, but I suspect that it originated, in the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span>distant past, +with the poverty of rhyme-invention on the part of the writers of the +cruder kind of pantomime songs—"round the houses," for example, being +both a rhyme to and a synonym for "trousies" (garments beloved of those +bards!)—and thus the vogue developed. This is only a theory. The one +thing certain is that a clumsy form of slang, devoid of the humour and +compactness which justify slang—and which were on the whole once +characteristic of metropolitan slang—has tickled the ear of some +millions of men who, but for the war, would never have fallen under its +temptation. The only thing to hope for is that it will run its course +and perish—like "What ho, she bumps!" and "Now we shan't be +long!"—without leaving any visible and permanent trace upon the +language.</p> + +<p>"Clicked," another word used by my trench-feet associate, resembles much +modern slang in the breadth and elasticity of its application. To click +can be either advantageous or baneful, according to the circumstances. A +soldier asks a superior for a favour, and it is granted. That <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span>soldier +has clicked. Or if he finds a nice girl to walk out with, he has +clicked. Or if he is given a coveted post, he has clicked. But he has +also clicked if he is suddenly seized on to do some menial duty. He has +clicked if he is discovered in a misdeed. And he has clicked a packet if +he gets into trouble generally. On such an occasion, it may be added, +the N.C.O. or officer who administers a reproof ("ticks him off"), and +does so in angry terms, "goes in off the deep end."</p> + +<p>Not all army slang is lacking, indeed, in a facetious irony. Miserable +conditions in the desert or in the trenches, bad accommodation, doubtful +food—anything which cannot arouse the faintest enthusiasm of any +sort—these, in the lingo of our now much-travelled and stoical troops, +are "nothing to write home about." Surely there is an admirable spirit +in this sarcasm. It crops up again in the hospital metaphor "going to +the pictures." That is Tommy's way of announcing that he is to go under +the surgeon's knife, on a visit to the operating theatre. Again, there +is a sardonic tang in the army's condemnation of one who has <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span>been +telling a far-fetched story: he has been "chancing his arm" (or "mit"). +Similarly one detects an oblique and wry fun in the professional army +man's use of the word "sieda" to mean "socks." (The new army more feebly +dubs them "almond rocks.") "Sieda" has been brought by the Anzacs from +Cairo, and with them it means "Good morning!"—a mere friendly hail, now +used with great frequency. But the veterans of older expeditions in +Egypt and in India, when they had been on the march, took their socks +from their perspiring feet and lay down to sleep; and in the +morning—well, their socks said "Sieda!" to them when they awoke, and +were christened accordingly.... Or again, the socks (or other property) +might have vanished in the night—in which case there had been "hooks +about" (pilferers about). If one of those "hooks" were caught, he would +be first "rammed in the mush" (put in the guardroom), and then, if his +guilt were established, he would be observed "going over the wall" or +"going to stir" (going to the detention prison).</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span></p><p>A few other slang words which I have come across in the hospital, and +which seem to me to bear the mark of the old army as distinct from the +new, are: "bondook," a rifle; "sound scoff" (to the bugler, to sound +Rations); "scran," victuals, rations; "weighing out," paying out; +"chucking a dummy," being absent; "get the wind up," be afraid (and "put +the wind up," make afraid); "the home farm," the married quarters; +"chips," the pioneer sergeant (carpenter); "tank," wet canteen; +"tank-wallah," a drinker; "tanked," drunk; "A.T.A. wallah," a +teetotaller (from the Army Temperance Association); "on the cot" or "on +the tack," being teetotal; "jammy," lucky (and "jam," any sort of good +fortune); "win," to steal; "burgoo," porridge; "eye-wash," making things +outwardly presentable; "gone west," died (also applied to things broken, +<i>e.g.</i> a broken pipe has "gone west"); "oojah," anything (similar to +thingummy or what-d'ye-call-it); "push," "pusher," or "square push," a +girl (hence "square-push tunic," the "swagger" tunic for walking-out +occa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span>sions). The words for drunkenness are innumerable—"jingled," +"oiled," "tanked to the wide," "well sprung," "up the pole," "blotto," +etc.; but I smell the modern in some of these; their flavour is of +London taverns rather than of the dusty barrack squares of India, Egypt, +Malta, and Gibraltar.</p> + +<p>But who can delve to the ultimate springs of slang? A verb which I never +met before I enlisted was "to spruce." This is almost, if not quite, a +blend of "swinging the lead" and "doing a mike." To spruce is to dodge +duty or to deceive. A man who contrived to slip out of the ranks of a +squad when they were performing some distasteful task would be said to +"spruce off." Or he would be denounced as a "sprucer" if he managed to +arrive late for his meal and yet, by a trick, to secure a front place in +the waiting queue at the canteen. A word in constant employment, +"spruce"! It was new to me when I became an orderly, and for a long time +I thought that it was peculiar to our unit, in the same manner that the +jargon of certain boys is peculiar to certain schools. But I concluded +later that it might have a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span>remote and roundabout origin in the old army +slang, "a spruce hand" at "brag"—the latter being a variant of the game +of poker, and a spruce hand, apparently, one which, held by a bluffer, +contained cards of no real value.</p> + +<p>Some day these etymological mysteries must be probed. Perhaps the German +professors, after the war, can usefully wreak themselves on this complex +and obscure research. Meanwhile the above notes are offered not as a +serious contribution to a subject so immense, but rather as a warning. +The infectiousness of slang is incredible; and this gigantic +inter-association of classes and clans has brought about a hitherto +unheard-of levelling-down of the common speech. Accent may or may not be +influenced: the vocabulary undoubtedly is. Nearly every home in the land +is soon going to be invaded by many forms of army slang: the process in +fact has already begun. If we were a sprightlier nation the effect might +not be all to the bad. But most of our slang-mongers are not wits. "He +was balmy a treat," I heard a soldier say of another soldier who had +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span>shammed insane. That is what we are coming to: it is the tongue we +shall use and likewise (I fear) the condition in which some of us will +find ourselves as a result.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XV" id="XV"></a>XV</h2> + +<h2>A BLIND MAN'S HOME-COMING</h2> + + +<p>In my boyhood I had the ambition—it was one of several ambitions—to +become a courier. The <i>Morning Post</i> advertisements of couriers who +professed to be fluent in a number of languages and were at the disposal +of invalid aristocrats desiring to take extensive (and expensive) trips +abroad, aroused the most romantic visions in my mind. A courier's was +the life for me. I saw myself whirling all over Europe—with my +distinguished invalid—in sleeping-cars de luxe. Anon we were crossing +the Atlantic or lolling in punkah-induced breezes on the verandahs of +Far Eastern hotels. It was a great profession, that of the experienced +and successful courier.</p> + +<p>I have never been a courier in quite this picturesque acceptation; and +yet, in a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span>humbler sense, I have perhaps (to my own surprise) earned the +title. As an R.A.M.C. orderly I have more than once officiated as +travelling courier—yes, and to distinguished, if far from affluent, +invalids. They ought, at least, to rank as distinguished; for the reason +they needed a courier was because they had given their health, or limbs, +or eyesight, in defence of their country.</p> + +<p>It happens only too often that when a patient is discharged from +hospital he is not fit to make his journey home alone. An orderly is +detailed to accompany him. Sometimes the lot has fallen on me. Generally +the trip is a short one, to some outlying suburb of London or to some +town or village in the home counties; but sometimes my flights have been +further afield, to Ireland, or Wales; and once I went to Yorkshire with +a blind man.</p> + +<p>That Yorkshire expedition was singularly lacking in drama and in surface +pathos, yet its details remain with great clearness. The piece of +damaged goods which, being of no further fighting use, was being +returned with thanks to the hearthside <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span>from whence it came, was an +individual answering to the unheroic cognomen of Briggs. A +high-explosive shell had been sent by the Gods to alter the current of +Briggs's career. Briggs came through all that part of the war which +concerned him without a scratch upon his person—only after the arrival +in his immediate vicinity of the high-explosive shell he was +unfortunately unable to see. Never again would Briggs be of the +slightest value either as a soldier or in his civilian trade, which was +that of driver of ponies in a coal-mine. Consequently, as a +distinguished invalid (with the sum of one pound in his pocket to +comfort him until such time as his pension should materialise), +Mister—no longer Private—Briggs, for the first and presumably the last +time in his existence, went travelling with a courier.</p> + +<p>A car supplied by the National Motor Volunteer Service awaited Briggs +and his courier at the hospital entrance. Here the introduction between +Briggs and his courier took place. Ours is a large hospital, and I had +never to my knowledge encountered Briggs before that moment. I beheld <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span>a +young fellow (he was only twenty-three) with a stout, healthy visage +which wore a pleasant smile and would have been describable as roguish, +only ... well, the eyes of a blind man, whatever else they are, are not +conducive to a roguish mien. They were eyes not visibly damaged: nice +blue eyes. And they stared at nothingness. I was in the presence of a +stripling who, a few weeks ago, must have owned a mobile face, and was +in rapid process of developing a quite different face, a face which +still might—it certainly did—grin and laugh, but which would gradually +gain, had already begun to gain, a set expressionlessness that overlaid +and strangely neutralised its grins and its laughter.</p> + +<p>Blind men's faces may have beauty, even vivacity, or a heightened +intelligence and fire; but there is a something, hard to define, of +which they are sadly devoid. The windows of the soul are dimmed. The +face inevitably changes. And if even I, who knew not Briggs, could +perceive that Briggs's face must thus have changed, how much more +conspicuous would the change be to the partner whom Briggs had left +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span>seven months before and to whom I was now leading him back—his wife.</p> + +<p>Briggs, a civilian once more, sported reach-me-down garments which +fitted him surprisingly—our Clothing Store sergeant is the kindest of +souls and expends infinite patience on doing his best, with +government-contract tailoring, to suit all our discharges. His overcoat, +which might have been called a Chesterfield in Shoreditch, pleased +Briggs, as he told me in the car: he drew my attention to its texture +and warmth, he admiringly fingered it. "I might ha' paid thirty bob for +that there top-coat," he surmised. "A collar an' a tie an' all, too! +Them boots ain't so dusty, neither: they fit me a treat. Goin' 'ome to +my missus in Sunday clobber, I am." You would have said that he thought +he had emerged from his hazards with rather a good bargain. A jumble of +ready-made clothes—and a pension! The visible world gone for ever! +These were his souvenirs of the great war. And, "Ah," he said, when I +ventured on some allusion to his blindness, "it might ha' bin worse. I +don' know what I'd ha' done if I'd lost <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span>a leg, same as some of them +other poor jossers in th' hospital!"</p> + +<p>(And this, marvellous though it sounds, is the standpoint of no small +number in the legion of our Briggses.)</p> + +<p>The motor ride was another source of gratification to Briggs. Seated +beside me, the wind beating on his sightless orbs, he discoursed of the +wonders of petrol. "Proper to take you about, them cars. W'ere are we +now? 'Ave we far to run, like?" I told him we were traversing Battersea +Park and that our destination was St. Pancras. It transpired that he was +a stranger to London. This drive through London was, as it were, an item +in his collection of experiences, to be preserved with the cross-channel +voyage and the vigils in the trenches. "Shall we go by Buckingham +Palace?" I told him we shouldn't; then, observing that he was +disappointed, I asked the driver to make the détour. So at last I was +able to inform Briggs that we were passing Buckingham Palace: I turned +his head so that he looked straight towards that architectural +phenomenon. It was, of course, invisible to him. No matter. He wished to +be able <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span>to boast, to his wife, that he had seen (he used that verb) the +house where the King lived.</p> + +<p>His wife—he married a month before he enlisted—had been notified of +his return; but I suggested that at St. Pancras we might telegraph to +her the actual hour of the train's arrival, in case she should desire to +meet it. The idea commended itself to Briggs: he had not thought of such +a thing: telegraphing had perhaps hardly come within his purview, at +least so I surmised when, the telegraph-form before me, I asked him what +he wished me to write. He began cheerily, as though dictating a letter +of gossip:—"<i>My dear wife</i>—" Economy necessitated a taboo of this +otherwise charming method of communication. "<i>Arriving Bradford +five-thirty, Tom</i>," was the result of final boilings-down, which took so +long that we nearly achieved the anticlimax of missing our train +altogether.</p> + +<p>Now at Bradford (at the end of one of the chattiest five hours I ever +spent in my life) no Mrs. Briggs was perceptible. I kept my patient on +the platform until every other <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span>passenger had gone: I marched him up and +down the main area of the station. Each time I caught sight of a woman +who looked a possible Mrs. Briggs I steered my charge into her vicinity. +In spite of a piece of information which Briggs had imparted to me on +the journey—namely, that he expected soon to become a father—I was +surprised that his wife had not come to the station to welcome him. +However, it was plain that Briggs himself was not particularly +surprised, nor, what was more important, disappointed. Nothing could +damp his eternal placidity and good humour. He proposed that from this +point onward he should pursue his journey alone. "Nowt to do but git on +th' tram," he said. "It's a fair step from 'ere, but I knows every inch +of t' way." At all events (as of course I could not allow this) he would +now act as my guide. And he did. "First to the right.... Now we're goin' +by a big watchmaker's-and-jeweller's.... Now cross t' street.... Now on +th' corner over there by t' Sinnemer is w'ere we git our tram."</p> + +<p>The tram in due course appeared, and we <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span>boarded it. "Tha mun pay +thrippence only, mind," he warned me when the conductor came round. +"It's a rare long ride for thrippence." So it proved to be—through +wildernesses which were half meadow and half slum, my cicerone at every +hundred yards pointing out the notable features of the landscape. On our +left I ought to see the so-and-so public house; on our right the +football ground—I should know it by the grand-stand jutting above the +palings; further on were brickworks; further still a factory which, my +nose would have told me, even if Mr. Briggs had not, dealt with +chemicals; then, on the skyline, a pit-head; then another; then a mining +village with three different kinds of methodist church and two picture +palaces; then a gap of dreary, dirty fields. And then, nearing dusk, the +village where my friend lived, and where also was the terminus of the +tram route.</p> + +<p>We quitted the tram and walked down a street of those squalid brick +tenements which coal-mining seems to germinate like a rash upon the +earth's surface. The debris and the scaffoldings of pits were dotted +about <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span>the adjacent countryside. Sooty cabbage-patches occupied the +occasional interspaces in the ranks of houses. Briggs directed me across +a cinder path in one of these cabbage-patches. "See them three 'ouses at +the bottom of the 'ill? The end one's mine." We approached. No sign of +the wife. Surely she would be on the look-out for her husband? Also +there was a sister and a brother-in-law—the latter in a prosperous way +of business as a grocer near-by: Briggs had told me of them. Would not +they be watching for him? I began to be anxious. Not once, but several +times, I had heard of the wounded soldier returning to his home and +finding no home: both home and wife had gone. (Those are bitterly tragic +tales, which a realist must write some day.) Still, as we came nearer, I +saw nobody at the cottage door. "Is th' door open?" asked Briggs. Yes, +it was open. When we were at the end of the cabbage-patch, and I could +discern the interior of the cottage parlour (into which the door opened +direct), it became clear that three persons were there. One of them, a +man, obviously the brother-in-law, came and peeped out of the window <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span>at +us, and turned and spoke to his companions. Of these two, both women, +one rose from her chair and the other remained seated. But none of the +three came to the door.</p> + +<p>I have met northern dourness and the inarticulate manner which is such a +contrast to the gushing and noisy effusion of the south. By a paradox it +is not inconsistent with the familiar conversationalism to which Briggs +had treated me, a stranger. But I admit I found Briggs's family circle a +little embarrassing. They were respectable people: the cottage was neat +and decently furnished, its occupants were sprucely dressed. I fancy +they were in their best clothes; certainly their demeanour—and the +aspect of the table in their midst—denoted a great occasion. This +table, as I saw when I assisted Briggs up the steps into the room, had +indeed borne a well-spread tea. No very acute powers of deduction were +required to decide, from the crumbs on the white cloth and on the +dishes, that there <i>had</i> been bread and butter and jam and cake. Of +these not a vestige (except the crumbs) remained.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> Briggs and I were an +hour behindhand, and the relatives who awaited the wanderer had eaten +the banquet laid to welcome him: or so it appeared. I have no doubt that +all sorts of delicacies were in the cupboard; the kettle on the hob was +probably on the boil; perhaps buttered toast was in the oven. The fact +remains that devastation was on the table.</p> + +<p>However, Briggs did not see the table, and the table's state occupied me +only for a fraction of a second. I was more concerned with the three +people in the parlour and with their reception of my patient. The pale +woman in the chair by the fire was evidently Briggs's wife. She stared +at us, as we entered, but said absolutely nothing. Nor did the other and +slightly younger woman, his sister, say anything. She too stared. And +the man stared, and said nothing.</p> + +<p>"Well, here we are," I announced—an imbecile assertion, but I produced +it as cheerfully and matter-of-factly as I knew how. I unhooked my arm +from Briggs's, and made as though to push him forward into the family +group.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span></p><p>"Nay!" said Briggs. "I mun take my top-coat off first."</p> + +<p>I helped him off with his coat. Not one of the three members of his +family had either moved or spoken—beyond one faint murmur, not an +actual word, in response to my "Here we are." But Briggs seemed to know +that his folk were in the room with him, and he neither accosted them, +expressed any curiosity about them, or betrayed any astonishment at +their silence.</p> + +<p>When he had got his coat off I expected him to move forward into the +room. A mistake. Mine must be a hasty temperament. They don't do things +like that in Yorkshire, not even when they have come home blinded from +the wars. Briggs put out his hand, felt for the cottage door, half +closed it, felt for a nail on the inner side of it, and carefully hung +his coat thereon.</p> + +<p><i>Now</i> I could usher him into the waiting family circle.</p> + +<p>No. I was wrong.</p> + +<p>Briggs calmly divested himself of his jacket. He then felt for another +door, a door which opened on to a stair leading to the upper storey. On +a nail in this door he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span>hung his jacket. And then, in his shirt-sleeves, +he was ready. Shirt-sleeves were symbolical. He was home at last, and +prepared to sit down with his people.</p> + +<p>Of the actual reunion I saw nothing, for I promptly said I must go. It +was imperative for me to hurry back, or I should miss my train.</p> + +<p>"You'll stay an' take a sup of tea with us," said Briggs.</p> + +<p>I couldn't, though I should have liked to do so, in some ways, and in +others should have hardly dared to be an intruder on such a meeting. I +shook hands with my patient. Looking back as I went out of the door I +saw Briggs's wife still seated, motionless, in her chair. She had not +opened her lips. It was impossible to divine what were her emotions. She +was very pale. There were no tears in her eyes as she stared at her +young blind husband. But I think there were tears waiting to be shed.</p> + +<p>I looked back again when I reached the end of the path across the +cabbage-patch. The cottage door was still open. In the aperture stood +the younger of the two <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span>women, Briggs's sister. She waved to me and +smiled. It was evident that it had struck her that I ought to have been +thanked for my services, and she was expressing this, cordially if +belatedly. I waved my hand in return, and hastened up the street towards +the tram.</p> + +<p>My hurry was fruitless. I missed my train in Bradford, and stayed the +night at an hotel, thus (with appropriate but improper extravagance) +concluding this particular performance in the rôle of travelling courier +to a distinguished invalid. As I sat over a sumptuous table d'hôte—this +was long before the submarine blockade and the food restrictions—I +wondered what Briggs's wife said to Briggs; and I made up a story about +it. But what I have written above is not a story, it is the unadorned +truth, which I could not have invented and which is perhaps better than +the story. In his courier's presence Briggs addressed not one word to +his wife, and his wife addressed not one word to him; nor did his sister +or his brother-in-law. Nor did any of this trio address one word to me.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span></p><p class='center'><small>PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY<br /> +HAZELL, WATSON AND VINEY, LD., LONDON AND AYLESBURY,<br /> +FOR SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT & CO., LTD.</small></p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span></p> + +<h2>Popular 1/- net Novels</h2> + +<p class='center'>"<i>'Arf a Mo', Pinky!</i>"</p> + +<p><span style="font-size:150%;font-weight: bold;">Private Pinkerton, Millionaire</span></p> + +<p> <b>By HAROLD ASHTON</b></p> + +<p>The rollicking adventures of Pte. Pinkerton, Millionaire, and his pal, +that irrepressible and courageous soldier, Pte. William Bailey—"Bill," +to his friends—ex-burglar, humorist, and all-round sportsman.</p> + + +<p style="margin-top: 2em;"><span style="font-size:150%;font-weight: bold;">Phillip in Particular</span></p> + +<p> <b>By W. DOUGLAS NEWTON</b></p> + +<p>(<i>Phillip, with two "l's" please, and said slowly.</i>) Has delighted +thousands of our boys in the Army.</p> + + +<p style="margin-top: 2em;"><span style="font-size:150%;font-weight: bold;">Gloria. </span><b>A South African Story</b></p> + +<p> <b>By CHARLOTTE MANSFIELD, F.R.G.S.</b></p> + +<p><span style="margin-left: 6em;">Author of "The Dupe," etc.</span></p> + + +<p style="margin-top: 2em;"><span style="font-size:150%;font-weight: bold;">Noted Murder Mysteries</span></p> + +<p> <b>By Mrs. BELLOC LOWNDES</b></p> + +<p><span style="margin-left: 6em;">Author of "The Lodger," etc.</span></p> + +<p>"Will hold more firmly than the latest novel."—<i>Sheffield Daily +Independent.</i></p> + + +<p style="margin-top: 2em;"><span style="font-size:150%;font-weight: bold;">Gay Lawless</span></p> + +<p> <b>By HELEN MATHERS</b></p> + +<p><span style="margin-left: 6em;">Author of "Comin' Thro' the Rye," etc., etc.</span></p> + + +<p style="margin-top: 2em;"><span style="font-size:150%;font-weight: bold;">Confessions of a Wife</span></p> + +<p> <b>Being the life story of Margaret X.</b></p> + +<p>Retold from her diaries and letters by her friend A. C. L. "It reveals +something of the soul of a woman."—<i>Evening News.</i></p> + + +<p style="margin-top: 2em;"><span style="font-size:150%;font-weight: bold;">Our Famous Boxers</span></p> + +<p> <b>By C. F. WARD</b> ("Corinthian" of the <i>Daily Chronicle</i>).</p> + +<p>This book deals with the varied methods by which our famous boxers made +their names in the sporting world. <i>Illustrated.</i></p> + +<p style="margin-top: 2em;"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span></p><p><span style="font-size:150%;font-weight: bold;">Echoes of Flanders</span></p> + +<p> <b>By CHARLES L. WARR</b></p> + +<p><span style="margin-left: 6em;">Author of "The Unseen Host."</span></p> + +<p class='right'><b>5s.</b> net. By post <b>5s. 4d.</b></p> + +<p>"These stories of the great war make the great tragedy to pass clear and +vivid before the reader's eye. His purpose has been to make real to +those at home the endurance and the heroism of our soldiers, and in this +he has perfectly succeeded. We need books such as this to keep us awake +to the horrors of these days. For there is a danger of becoming +acclimatised even to the brutalities of war."—<i>Scotsman.</i></p> + + +<p style="margin-top: 2em;"><span style="font-size:150%;font-weight: bold;">Mud and Khaki</span></p> + +<p> <b>By VERNON BARTLETT</b></p> + +<p class='right'><b>3s. 6d.</b> net. By post <b>3s. 10d.</b></p> + +<p>"A very clever and enjoyable collection of sketches picturing the +character of the fighting men in the trenches, the tragedy and the +farce, the humour, and the elementary humanity that crudely jostle each +other in his life."—<i>Globe.</i></p> + +<p>"There is much humour and some pathos, and always reality and the +splendid spirit of the British Soldier in them."—<i>Westminster Gazette.</i></p> + +<p>"Sketches from Flanders and France. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Observations of an Orderly + Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital + + +Author: Ward Muir + + + +Release Date: February 1, 2006 [eBook #17655] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OBSERVATIONS OF AN ORDERLY*** + + +E-text prepared by Suzanne Lybarger, Irma Spehar, and the Project +Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/) from +page images generously made available by Internet Archive/Canadian +Libraries (http://www.archive.org/details/toronto) + + + +Note: Images of the original pages are available through + Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries. See + http://www.archive.org/details/observationsorderly00muiruoft + + + + + +OBSERVATIONS OF AN ORDERLY + +Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital + +by + +L.-CPL. WARD MUIR, R.A.M.C. (T.) + + + + + + + +Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, +Kent & Co., Ltd., 4 Stationers' +Hall Court : : : London, E.C.4 +Copyright +First published July 1917 + + + + +Novels by the Author of "Observations of an Orderly" + +THE AMAZING MUTES +WHEN WE ARE RICH +CUPID'S CATERERS + +Also Editor of + +"HAPPY--THOUGH WOUNDED" + The Book of the Third London General Hospital + + + + +TO + +LT.-COL. H.E. BRUCE PORTER, C.M.G. + +OFFICER IN COMMAND OF THE + +3RD LONDON + +GENERAL HOSPITAL + + + + +Some passages from _Observations of an Orderly_ have appeared, +generally in a shorter form, in _The Spectator_, _The New Statesman_, +_The Hospital_, _The Evening Standard_, _The National News_, _The Dundee +Advertiser_, _The Daily News_, and _The Daily Mail_. The author desires +to make the usual acknowledgments to their editors. + +The coloured design on the paper wrapper is by Sergeant Noel Irving, +R.A.M.C. (T.), a member of the unit at the 3rd London General Hospital. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +I PAGE +MY FIRST DAY 19 + +II +LIFE IN THE ORDERLIES' HUTS 33 + +III +WASHING-UP 51 + +IV +A "HUT" HOSPITAL 65 + +V +FROM THE "D BLOCK" WARDS 79 + +VI +WHEN THE WOUNDED ARRIVE 93 + +VII +"T.... A...." 107 + +VIII +LAUNDRY PROBLEMS 121 + +IX +ON BUTTONS 137 + +X +A WORD ABOUT "SLACKERS IN KHAKI" 147 + +XI +THE RECREATION ROOMS 159 + +XII +THE COCKNEY 173 + +XIII +THE STATION PARTY 201 + +XIV +SLANG IN A WAR HOSPITAL 219 + +XV +A BLIND MAN'S HOME-COMING 235 + + + + +I + +MY FIRST DAY + + +The sergeant in charge of the clothing store was curt. He couldn't help +it: he had run short of tunics, also of "pants"--except three pairs +which wouldn't fit me, wouldn't fit anybody, unless we enlisted three +very fat dwarfs: he had kept on asking for tunics and pants, and they'd +sent him nothing but great-coats and water-bottles: I could take his +word for it, he wished he was at the Front, he did, instead of in this +blessed hole filling in blessed forms for blessed clothes which never +came. Impossible, anyhow, to rig me out. I was going on duty, was I? +Then I must go on duty in my "civvies." + +It was a disappointment. Your new recruit feels that no small item of +his reward is the privilege of beholding himself in khaki. The escape +from civilian clothes was, at that era, one of the prime lures to +enlistment. I had attempted to escape before, and failed. Now at last I +had found a branch of the army which would accept me. It needed my +services instantly. I was to start work at once. Nothing better. I was +ready. This was what I had been seeking for months past. But--I confess +it--I had always pictured myself dressed as a soldier. The postponement +of this bright vision for even twenty-four hours, now that it had seemed +to be within my grasp, was damping. However--! The Sergeant-Major had +told me that I was to go on duty as orderly in Ward W--an officers' +ward--at 2 p.m. prompt. I did not know where Ward W was; I did not know +what a ward-orderly's functions should amount to. And I had no uniform. +I was attired in a light grey lounge suit--appropriate enough to my +normal habit, but quite too flippant, I was certain, for a ward-orderly. +Whatever else a ward-orderly might be, I was sure that he was not the +sort of person to sport a grey lounge suit. + +Still, I must hie me to Ward W. I had got my wish. I was in the army at +last. In the army one does not argue. One obeys. So, having been +directed down an interminable corridor, I presented myself at Ward W. + +On entering--I had knocked, but no response rewarded this courtesy--I +was requested, by a stern-visaged Sister, to state my business. Her +sternness was excusable. The visiting-hour was not yet, and in my +unprofessional guise she had taken me for a visitor. My explanation +dispelled her frowns. She was expecting me. Her present orderly had been +granted three days' leave. He was preparing to depart. I was to act as +his substitute. Before he went he would initiate me into the secrets of +his craft. She called him. "Private Wood!" Private Wood, in his +shirt-sleeves, appeared. I was handed over to him. + +Herein I was fortunate, though I was unaware of it at the time. Private +Wood, who was not too proud to wash dishes (which was what he had at +that moment been doing), is a distinguished sculptor and a man of keen +imagination. At a subsequent period that imagination was to bring forth +the masks-for-facial-disfigurements scheme which gained him his +commission and which has attracted world-wide notice from experts. +Meanwhile his imagination enabled him to understand the exact extent of +a novice's ignorance, the precise details which I did not know and must +know, the essential apparatus I had to be shown the knack of, before he +fled to catch his train. + +He devoted just five minutes, no more, to teaching me how to be a +ward-orderly. Four of those minutes were lavished on the sink-room--a +small apartment that enshrines cleaning appliances, the taps of which, +if you turn them on without precautions, treat you to an involuntary +shower bath. The sink-room contains a selection of utensils wherewith +every orderly becomes only too familiar: their correct employment, a +theme of many of the mildly Rabelaisian jests which are current in every +hospital, is a mystery--until some kind mentor, like Private Wood, lifts +the veil. In four minutes he had told me all about the sink-room, and +all about all the gear in the sink-room and all about a variety of +rituals which need not here be dwelt on. (The sink-room is an excellent +place in which to receive a private lecture.) The fifth minute was spent +in introducing me, in another room, the ward kitchen, to Mrs. +Mappin--the scrub-lady. + +A scrub-lady is attached to each ward; and most wards, it should in +justice be added, are attached to their scrub-ladies. Certainly I was to +find that Ward W was attached to Mrs. Mappin. Mrs. Mappin was washing +up. Private Wood had been helping her. The completion of his task he +delegated to me. "Mrs. Mappin, this is our new orderly. He'll help you +finish the lunch-dishes." Private Wood then slid into his tunic, +snatched his cap from a nail in the wall, and vanished. + +Mrs. Mappin surveyed me. "Ah!" she sighed--she was given to sighing. +"He's a good 'un, is Private Wood." The inference was plain. There was +little hope of my becoming such a good 'un. In any case, my natty grey +tweeds were against me. One could never make an orderliesque impression +in those tweeds. "Better take your jacket off," sighed Mrs. Mappin. I +did so, chose a dishcloth, and started to dry a pyramid of wet plates. +For a space Mrs. Mappin meditated, her hands in soapy water. Then she +withdrew them. "I think," she sighed, "you an' me could do with a cup of +tea." + +And presently I was having tea with Mrs. Mappin. + +I was afterwards to learn that this practice of calling a halt in her +labours for a cup of tea was a highly incorrect one on Mrs. Mappin's +part, and that my share in the transaction was to the last degree +reprehensible. But I was also to learn that faithful, selfless, honest, +and diligent scrub-ladies are none too common; and the Sister who +discovers that she has been allotted such a jewel as Mrs. Mappin is +seldom foolish enough to exact from her a strict obedience to the letter +of the law in discipline. Mrs. Mappin, in her non-tea-bibbing +interludes, toiled like a galley-slave, was rigidly punctual, and never +complained. Her sighs were no index of her character. They were not a +symptom of ennui (though possibly--if the suggestion be not rude--of +indigestion caused by tannin poisoning). She was the best-tempered of +creatures. It is a fact that if I had been so disposed I need never have +given Mrs. Mappin any assistance, though it was within my province to do +so. She would, without a murmur, shoulder other people's jobs as well as +her own. Having finished with bearing children (one was at the Front--it +was Mrs. Mappin who, on being asked the whereabouts of her soldier son, +said, "'E's in France; I don't rightly know w'ere the place is, but it's +_called_ 'Dugout'"), she had settled down, for the remainder of her +sojourn on this plane, to a prospect of work, continuous work. A little +more or a little less made no difference to her. She had nothing else to +do, but work; nothing else to be interested in, except work--and her +children's progress, and her cups of tea. Her ample figure concealed a +warm heart. Behind her wrinkled old face there was a brain with a +limited outfit of ideas--and the chief of those ideas was _work_. + +Our cup of tea was refreshing, but it would be incorrect to convey the +notion that I was allowed to linger over such a luxury. There are few +intervals for leisure in the duty-hours of an orderly in an officers' +ward. Had the Sister and her nurses not been occupied elsewhere, I doubt +whether I should have been free to drink that cup of tea at all--a +circumstance of which perhaps Mrs. Mappin was more aware than I. At any +rate the call of "Orderly!" from a patient summoned me from the kitchen +and into the ward long before I had finished drying Mrs. Mappin's +dishes. + +The patient desired some small service performed for him. I performed +it--remembering to address him as "Sir." Various other patients, +observing my presence, took the opportunity to hail me. I found myself +saying "Yes, Sir!" "In a moment, Sir!" and dropping--with a promptitude +on which I rather flattered myself--into the manner of a cross between a +valet and a waiter, with a subtle dash of chambermaid. Soon I was also a +luggage-porter, staggering to a taxi with the ponderous impedimenta of a +juvenile second lieutenant who was bidding the hospital farewell, and +whose trunks contained--at a guess--geological specimens and battlefield +souvenirs in the shape of "dud" German shells. This young gentleman +fumbled with a gratuity, then thought better of it--and was gracious +enough to return my grin. "Bit awkward, tipping, in these days," he +apologised cheerily, depositing himself in his taxi behind ramparts of +holdalls. "Thank you, Sir," seemed the suitable adieu, and having +proffered it I scampered into the ward again. Anon Sister sent me with a +message to the dispensary. Where the dispensary was I knew not. But I +found out, and brought back what she required. Then to the post office. +Another exploration down that terrific corridor. Post office located at +last and duly noted. Then to the linen store to draw attention to an +error in the morning's supply of towels. Linen store eventually +unearthed--likewise the information that its staff disclaimed all +responsibility for mistakes--likewise the first inkling of a profound +maxim, that when a mistake has been made, in hospital, it is always the +orderly, and no one else, who has made it. + +Engaged on these errands, and a host of intervening lesser exploits in +the ward, I had to cultivate an unwonted fleetness of foot. I flew. So +did the time. Almost immediately, as it seemed to me, I was bidden to +serve afternoon tea to our patients. The distribution of bed-tables, of +cups, of bread-and-butter (most of which, also, I cut); the "A little +more tea, Sir?" or, "A pot of jam in your locker, Sir, behind the pair +of trousers?... Yes, here it is, Sir"; the laborious feeding of a +patient who could not move his arms;--all these occupied me for a +breathless hour. Then an involved struggle with a patient who had to be +lifted from a bath-chair into bed. (I had never lifted a human being +before.) Then a second bout of washing-up with Mrs. Mappin. Then a +nominal half-an-hour's respite for my own tea--actually ten minutes, for +I was behindhand. Then, all too soon, more waitering at the ceremony of +Dinner: this time with the complication that some of my patients were +allowed wine, beer, or spirits, and some were not. "Burgundy, Sir?" +"Whiskey-and-soda, Sir?" I ran round the table of the sitting-up +patients, displaying (I was pleased to think) the complete aplomb and +nimbleness of a thoroughbred Swiss _garcon_, pouring out drinks--with +concealed envy--placing and removing plates, handing salt, bread, +serviettes.... After which, back to Mrs. Mappin and her renewed mountain +of once-more-to-be-washed-and-dried crockery. + +It was long after my own supper hour had come and gone that I was able +to say au revoir to the ward. The cleansing of the grease-encrusted +meat-tin was a travail which alone promised to last half the night. +(Mrs. Mappin eventually lent me her assistance, and later I became more +adroit.) And the calls of "Orderly!" from the bed patients were +interruptions I could not ignore. But at last some sort of conclusion +was reached. Mrs. Mappin put on her bonnet. The night orderly, who was +to relieve me, was overdue. Sister, discovering me still in the kitchen, +informed me that I might leave. + +"You ain't 'ad any supper, 'ave you?" said Mrs. Mappin. "You won't get +none now, neither. Should 'ave done a bunk a full hower back, you +should." + +She drew me into the larder, and indicated the debris of our patients' +repast. "A leg of chicken and some rice pudden. Only wasted if _you_ +don't 'ave it." + +"But is it allowed--?" I was, in truth, not only tired but ravenous. + +Sister, entering upon this conspiratorial dialogue, unhesitatingly gave +her approval. + +Cold rice pudding and a left-over leg of chicken, eaten standing, at a +shelf in a larder, can taste very good indeed, even to the wearer of a +spick-and-span grey lounge suit. I shall know in future what it means +when my restaurant waiter emerges from behind the screened service-door +furtively wiping his mouth. I sympathise. I too have wolfed the choice +morsels from the banquet of my betters. + + + + +II + +LIFE IN THE ORDERLIES' HUTS + + +In May, 1915, when I enlisted, the weather was beautiful. Consequently +the row of tin huts, to which I was introduced as my future address "for +the duration," wore an attractive appearance. The sun shone upon their +metallic sides and roofs. The shimmering foliage of tall trees, and a +fine field of grass, which made a background to the huts, were fresh and +green and restful to the eye. Even the foreground of hard-trodden +earth--the barrack square--was dry and clean, betraying no hint of its +quagmire propensities under rain. Later on, when winter came, the +cluster of huts could look dismal, especially before dawn on a wet +morning, when the bugle sounding parade had dragged us from warm beds; +or in an afternoon thaw after snow, when the corrugated eaves wept +torrents in the twilight, and one's feet (despite the excellence of army +boots) were chilled by their wadings through slush. Meanwhile, however, +the new recruit had nothing to complain of in the aspect of the housing +accommodation which was offered him. Merely for amusement's sake he had +often "roughed it" in quarters far less comfortable than these bare but +well-built huts--which even proved, on investigation, to contain beds: +an unexpected luxury. + +"I'll put you in Hut 6," said the Sergeant-Major. "There's one empty +bed. It's the hut at the end of the line." + +Thereafter Hut 6 was my home--and I hope I may never have a less +pleasant one or less good company for room-mates. In these latter I was +perhaps peculiarly fortunate. But that is by the way. It suffices that +twenty men, not one of whom I had ever seen before, welcomed a total +stranger, and both at that moment and in the long months which were to +elapse before various rearrangements began to scatter us, proved the +warmest of friends. + +Twenty-one of us shared our downsittings and our uprisings in Hut 6. +There might have been an even number, twenty-two, but one bed's place +was monopolised by a stove (which in winter consumed coke, and in summer +was the repository of old newspapers and orange-peel). The hut, +accordingly, presented a vista of twenty-one beds, eleven along one wall +and ten along the other, the stove and its pipe being the sole +interruption of the symmetrical perspective. Above the beds ran a +continuous shelf, bearing the hut-inhabitants' equipment, or at least +that portion of it--great-coat, water-bottle, mess-tin, etc.--not +continually in use. Below each bed its owner's box and his boots were +disposed with rigid precision at an exact distance from the box and +boots beneath the adjacent bed. In the ceiling hung two electric lights. +These, with the stove, beds, shelves, boxes and boots, constituted the +entire furniture of the hut--unless you count an alarm-clock, bought by +public subscription, and notable for a trick of tinkling faintly, as +though wanting to strike but failing, in the watches of the night, hours +before its appointed minute had arrived. The hut contained no other +furniture whatever, and in those days did not seem to us to require any. +In the autumn, when the daylight shortened and we could no longer hold +our parliaments on a bench outside, a couple of deck-chairs were +mysteriously imported; and, as the authorities remained unshocked, a +small table also appeared and was squeezed into a gap beside the stove. +Some sybarite even goaded us into getting up a fund for a strip of +linoleum to be laid in the aisle between the beds. This was done--I do +not know why, for personally I have no objection to bare boards. I +suppose linoleum is easier to keep clean than wood; and that aisle, +tramped on incessantly by hobnail boots which in damp weather were, as +to their soles and heels, mere bulbous trophies of the alluvial deposits +of the neighbourhood, was sometimes far from speckless. But to me the +strip of linoleum made our hut look remotely like a real room in a real +house: it was a touch of the conventional which I never cared for, and I +only subscribed to it when I had voted against it and been overborne. An +extraordinary proposition, that we should inaugurate a plant in a pot +on the stove's lid in summer, was, I am glad to say, negatived. It would +have been the thin end of the wedge ... we might have arrived at +Japanese fans and photograph-frames on the walls. + +Not that our Company Officer would have tolerated any nonsense of that +kind. Punctually at eight-thirty, after the second parade of the day, he +marched through each hut, inspecting it and calling the attention of the +Sergeant-Major to any detail which offended his sense of fitness. On wet +mornings, instead of parading outside, each man stood to his cot, and +thus the comments of the Company Officer, as he went down the aisle, +were audible to all. Stiffly drawn up to attention, we wondered +anxiously whether he would notice anything wrong with our buttons, boots +or belts, or whether he would "spot" the books and jam jars hidden +behind our overcoats on the shelves. Nothing so decadent and civilian as +a book--and certainly nothing so unsightly as a jam jar--must be visible +on your barrack-room shelf. It is sacred to equipment, and particularly +to the folded great-coat. + +"The Art of Folding" might have been the title of the first lesson of +the many so good-naturedly imparted to me by my new comrades. There was, +I learnt, a right way and a wrong way to fold all things foldable. The +great-coat, for instance, must at the finish of its foldings, when it is +placed upon the exactly middle spot above your bed's end, present to the +eye of the beholder a kind of flat-topped pyramid whose waist-line (if a +pyramid can be said to own a waist) is marked by the belt with the three +polished buttons peeping through. The belt must bulge neither to the +right nor to the left; the pyramidal edifice of great-coat must not +loll--it must sit up prim and firm. And unless all your foldings of the +great-coat, from first to last, have, been deftly precise, no pyramid +will reward you, but a flabby trapezium: the belt will sag, its buttons +won't come centrally, and indeed the whole edifice of unwieldy cloth +will topple off its perch on the narrow shelf--which was designed to +refuse all lodgment for the property of persons who had unsound ideas +on the subject of compact storage. + +The second series of folderies to which the novice was initiated +concerned themselves with his bedding. This consisted of a mattress, +three blankets and a pillow. It is an outfit at which no one need turn +up his nose. I never spent a bad night in army blankets, though when out +on leave I am sometimes a victim of insomnia between clean cold sheets. +But the moment the Reveille uplifted you from your couch, that couch had +to be made ship-shape according to rule. No finicky "airing"! The +mattress must be rolled up, with the pillow as its core, and placed at +the end of the bed. On top of it a blanket, folded longwise and with the +ends hanging down, was laid neatly; on top of _that_ you put the other +two blankets, folded quite otherwise; then you brought the first +blanket's ends over, and reversed the resultant bundle and pressed it +down into a thin stratified parallelogram with oval ends. The strata of +the said parallelogram, viewed from the aisle, must show no blanket +_edges_, only curves of the blankets' folds: the edges (if visible at +all) must face inwards, not outwards. Correct folding, to be sure, gave +no visible edges, viewed from either side; and, once you caught the +knack, correct folding was just as easy as incorrect--though there were +temperaments which did not find it so and which rebelled against these +niceties. + +I was afterwards to learn that this mania for matching (if mania be +indeed a legitimate word for a custom based on common-sense principles +and seldom carried to the extremes which the recruit has been led to +fear) obtains not only in the army but also in the nursing profession. +Not long after I became a ward orderly I got a wigging from my "Sister" +because I had not noticed that every pillow-case of a ward's beds must +face towards the same point of the compass: the pillows on the vista of +beds must be placed in such a manner that the pillow-case mouths are, +all of them, turned away from anyone entering the ward's door. Similarly +the overlap of the counterpanes must all be of exactly the same depth +and caught up at exactly the same angle, the resulting series of pairs +of triangles all ending at exactly the same spot in each bedstead. These +trifles reveal at a glance the professional touch in a ward, and are, I +understand, not by any means the insignia of a military as distinct from +a civilian hospital. They may or may not contribute to the comfort of +the patient, but they betoken the captaincy of one whose methodicalness +will in other and less visible respects most emphatically benefit him. + +Our hut life was something more than a mere folding-up of bedding on +bedsteads and great-coats on shelves. After midday dinner it was +allowable to unroll the mattress, make the bed, and rest thereon--which +most of us by that time (having been on the run since 6 o'clock parade) +were very ready to do. There was half an hour to spare before 2 o'clock +parade, and a precious half-hour it was. Snores rose from some of the +beds where students of the war had collapsed beneath the newspapers +which they had meant to read. Desultory conversation enlivened those +corners where the denizens of the hut were energetic enough to polish +their boots or sew on buttons. The one or two men who happened to be +"going out on pass"--we were allowed one afternoon per week--were +putting on their puttees and brushing-up the metal buttons of their +walking-out tunics (otherwise known as their Square Push Suits). The +buttons of their working tunics had of course been burnished before +parade. The correct employment of button-sticks and of the magic cleaner +called Soldier's Friend; the polishing of one's out-of-use boots and +their placing, on the floor, with tied laces, and with their toes in +line with the bed's legs; the substitution of lost braces' buttons by +"bulldogs"; the furbishing of one's belt; the propping-up of the front +of one's cap with wads of paper in the interior of the crown; the +devices whereby non-spiral puttees can be coaxed into a resemblance of +spiral ones and caused to ascend in corkscrews above trousers which +refuse to tuck unlumpily into one's socks--these, and a host of other +matters, always kept a proportion of the hut-dwellers awake and busy and +loquacious even in the somnolent post-prandial half-hour before 2 +o'clock. + +But it was at night, at bedtime, that the hut became generally sociable. +Lights-Out sounded at 10.15; and at 10.10 we were all scrambling into +our pyjamas. In winter our disrobing was hasty; in summer it was an +affair of leisure, and deshabille roamings to and fro in the aisle, and +gossip. When the bugle blew and the electric lights suddenly ceased to +glow, leaving the hut in a darkness broken only by the dim shapes of the +windows and the red of cigarette-ends, many of us still had to complete +our undressing. We became adepts at doing this in the dark and so +disposing of the articles of our attire that they could be instantly +retrieved in the morning. Once between the blankets, conversation at +first waxed rather than waned. The Night Wardmaster, whose duty it was +to make the round of the orderlies' huts, disapproved of conversation +after Lights-Out, and was apt to say so, loudly and menacingly, when he +surprised us by popping his head in at the door. But--well--the Night +Wardmaster always departed in the long run.... And then uprose, between +bed and bed, those unconclusive debates in which the masculine soul +delighteth: Theology; Woman; Victuals; Politics; Art; the Press; Sport; +Marriage; Money--and sometimes even The War; likewise the purely local +topics of Sisters and their Absurdities; Our Officers; The Other Huts; +What the Sergeant-Major Said; Why V.A.D.'s can't replace Male Orderlies; +What this Morning's Operations Looked Like; Whether an Officers' Ward or +a Men's Ward is the nicer; Who Deserves Stripes; C.O.'s Parade and its +Terrors; Advantages of Volunteering for Night Duty; The Cushy Job of +being in charge of a Sham Lunacy Case; Other Cushy Jobs less cushy than +They Sounded; and so forth; until at last protests began to be voiced by +the wearier folk who wanted silence. + +Silence it was, except for the thunder of occasional passing trains in +the near-by railway cutting. These had little power to disturb. Tucked +in the brown army blankets, which at first sight look so hard and so +prickly, we slumbered, the twenty-one of us, as one man; until, with a +cruel jolt, at 5.15 that wretched alarm-clock crashed forth its summons +for the fastidious few who liked to rise in ample time to bath and shave +before early parade. Sometimes I was of that virtuous band, and +sometimes I wasn't; but, either way, I hated the alarm-clock at +5.15,--though not so virulently as did those members of the hut who +never by any chance dreamt of rising until five to six. These gentry had +reduced the ritual of dressing, and of rolling up their bedding, to a +speed at which it might almost be compared to expert juggling: the +quickness of the hand deceived the eye. At five minutes to six you would +see the juggler asleep on his pillow, in blissful innocence; at six he +would be on parade, as correctly attired as you were yourself, and +having left behind him, in the hut, a bed as neatly folded as yours. The +world is sprinkled with people who can do this kind of thing--and our +hut was blessed with its due leaven of them. But I would not assert that +they _never_ had to put some finishing touches, either to their dress +or to their hut equipment foldings, before the Company Officer's tour of +inspection at 8.30. It sufficed that they would pass muster at 6 +o'clock, when appearances are less minutely important. And the man who +never rises till 5.55 detests an alarm-clock that whirrs at 5.15. The +hour at which the alarm-clock should be set to detonate was one of our +few acrimonious subjects of argument: I have even known it upset a +discussion on Woman. But the early risers had their way, and the clock +continued to be set for half an hour in front of Reveille. + +The harsh vibration of the alarm at one end of the day, and the expiry +of the Lights-Out talks at the other--these events marked the chief +time-divisions in our hut life. While we were absent at work, our +interests were many and scattered; but the hut was a nucleus for +communal bonds of union which evoked no little loyalty and affection +from us all. On the May morning when I first beheld that corrugated-iron +abode I thought it looked inviting enough; but I did not guess how fond +I was to grow of its barn-like interior and of the sportive crew who +shared its mathematically-allotted floor-space. "Next war," one optimist +suggested during a typical Lights-Out seance, "let's all enlist together +again." There were protests against the implied prophecy, but none +against the proposition as such. That is the spirit of hut comradeship +... a spirit which no alarm-clock controversies can do aught to impair; +for though 5.15 a.m. is an hour to test the temper of a troop of +twenty-one saints, 10.15 p.m. will bring geniality and garrulousness to +twenty-one sinners. + + + + +III + +WASHING-UP + + +The following substances (to which I had previously been almost a +stranger) absorbed much of my interest during my first months as a +hospital orderly: + +Coagulated pudding, mutton fat and beef fat, cold gravy, treacle, +congealed cocoa, suet duff, skins of once hot milk: + +Plates, cups, frying-pans and other utensils smeared with the above: + +Knives, forks and spoons, ditto. + +I am fated to go through life, in the future, not merely with an exalted +opinion of scullery-maids--this I should not regret--but also with an +only too clear picture, when at the dinner table, of the adventures of +each dish of broken meats on its exit from view. I have been behind the +scenes at the business of eating, or rather, at the dreadful repairs +which must be instituted when the business of eating is concluded in +order that the business of eating may recommence. + +There were days when the ward-kitchen was to me a battlefield and I +seemed to be fighting on the losing side. This was when our scrub-lady +was ill or had "got the sack" and it fell to me, the orderly, to do the +washing-up single-handed. Those patients who were well enough to be on +their feet were supposed to help. (I speak of a men's ward, of course, +not an officers'.) They did help, and that right willingly. Sometimes I +was blessed by the presence of a patient with a passion for cleaning +things. When there were no dishes to clean he would clean taps. When the +taps shone like gold he would clean the hooks on the dresser. When all +our kitchen gear was clean he would invade, with a kind of fury, the +sink-room and clean the apparatus there. When this was done he would +clean the ward's windows and door handles. Between-times he would clean +his boots and shave patients in bed. The new army is thickly sown with +men like that. They are the salt of the earth. I would place them at the +summit of the commonwealth's salary list, the bank clerk second, and the +business man, the artist and the politician at the bottom. At all events +these were my sentiments when a patient of this type, convalescing, +began to be able to help me with my kitchen chores. But it occasionally +chanced that every single patient in the ward was confined to bed. It +was then that I made my most intimate acquaintance with the catalogue of +horrors I have cited. + +You behold me, with my shirt-sleeves rolled up, faced by a heap of +twenty plates, twenty forks, twenty knives and twenty spoons, all +urgently requiring washing. Were these my whole task I should not +shrink. They would be nicely polished-off long ere one-fifteen +arrived--the time when I should (but probably shall not be able to) +leave for my own meal in the orderlies' mess. But there are two far more +serious opponents waiting to be subdued--the dinner-tin and the +pudding-basin. This pair are hateful beyond words. Their memory will +for ever haunt me, a spectral disillusionment to spoil the relish of +every repast I may consume in the years that are ahead. + +The dinner-tin was a rectangular box some three feet long, twenty inches +wide and six inches deep. It was made of solid metal, was fitted with a +false bottom to contain hot water, and was divided internally into three +compartments to hold meat, vegetables and duff. These viands were loaded +into the tin at the hospital's central kitchen. I had naught to do with +the cookery--which I may mention always seemed to me to be excellent. My +sole concern was with the helping-out of the food to the patients and +the restoration of the dinner-tin to its shelf in the central kitchen. +For unless I restored that tin in a faultless state of cleanliness, the +sergeant in charge of the central kitchen would require my blood. The +tin's number would betray me. The sergeant needed not to know my name: +all he had to do, on discovering the questionable tin, was to glance at +its number and then send for the orderly of the ward with a +corresponding number. + +He was a sergeant whose aspect could be very daunting. I never had to +come before him on the subject of a dirty dinner-tin. But he and I had +some small passages concerning "specials" (separate diets ordered for +patients requiring delicacies). Sometimes the necessary forms for the +specials had been incorrectly made out by a Sister with no head for army +accuracy in minor clerical details. Thereafter it was my unlucky place +to see the sergeant, and put the matter straight with him. I have +survived those encounters. I have survived them with an enhanced respect +for the sergeant and the organisation of his large and by no means +simple department. There were moments, nevertheless, when I approached +his presence with a sinking heart. For if I failed to "get round" him in +the matter of coaxing another special for a patient, there was Sister to +placate on my return to the ward; and it was quite impossible to +persuade Sister that she could have made a mistake with her diet sheets, +or, if she had, that it was of any consequence. + +The dinner-tin was somewhat larger than the sink in which I was supposed +to wash it. It was also very heavy. When full of food, and its false +bottom charged with hot water, I could only just lift it, and my +progress down the ward, carrying it from the trolley in the corridor to +the ward-kitchen, was a perilous and perspiring shuffle. As soon as all +the patients had been served I placed any left-over slices of meat in +the larder: these would be eaten at tea. Then I drained out the hot +water from the false bottom. Then (but only after experience had given +me wisdom) I ran hot water from the geyser tap into the now empty meat, +vegetable and duff compartments, and gave them a hurried swill: this to +rid them of the pestilent dregs of fatty material which would otherwise +have dried and glued themselves to the floor of the tin. The latter had +now to be put on one side, for I must be back in the ward attending to +my diners. Only when they had finished their meal, and their bed-tables +had been removed, folded up and placed neatly behind each bed, could I +tackle the tin in earnest. + +I abhor dabbling in grease; but life is full of abhorrent dilemmas which +must be endured; and the interior of that dinner-tin somehow got itself +cleaned, every day, in the long run. During the early part of any given +week I was almost happy over the job. For Monday was "Dry Store" day. On +Monday, and on Monday only--and you were helpless for the remainder of +the week if you forgot the rule--you could obtain, on presentation of a +chit, blacklead for the stoves, metal-polish for the brass, rags for +cleaning the floor, floor-polish, one box of matches, bath-brick, soft +soap, and--soda. It is an extraordinary chemical, soda. Before I became +a ward orderly I had no idea of the remarkable properties of soda. A +handful of soda in boiling water, and behold the grease dissolve meekly +from the nastiest dinner-tin! It was miraculous. When a pitying +scrub-lady first showed me the trick I thought that all my troubles were +at an end. Soda made the ward-kitchen seem like heaven. Alas, the +supply of soda considered sufficient by the Dry Store authorities never +lasted beyond Wednesday. On Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday the +dinner-tin had to be cleaned out not by alkaline agency, but by sheer +slogging hard labour. And when at last I stood it on edge to dry, and +thought to go off duty with a clear conscience, I generally found that I +had overlooked the waiting pudding-basin. + +On the whole I am inclined to pronounce the pudding-basin a more +obdurate utensil than even the dinner-tin. The pudding-basin, however, +only appeared every second morning. On duff days (duff being served in +the same tin as the meat and vegetables, though in a separate +compartment) we had no pudding. By pudding I mean milk pudding--rice or +sago or tapioca. Now a milk pudding, such as those my patients received, +though perhaps it was looked askance at in the nursery, is food which, +as an adult, I am far from despising. Rice pudding I have come with +maturer years to regard as a delicacy. Sago and tapioca I still eat +rather with amiable resignation than from choice. But any milk pudding, +as I now know, has a most vicious habit of cleaving to the dish in which +it was cooked. Rice is the least evil offender. The others are +absolutely wicked. To clean oleaginous scum from a dinner-tin is not +easy, but it is a mere bagatelle compared with cleaning the scorched +high-tide-mark of tapioca or sago from the shores of a large metal +pudding-basin. I have tried scraping with a knife blade, I have tried +every reasonable form of friction, and I can simply state as a fact from +my own personal experience (perhaps I am unfortunate) that those metal +pudding-basins of ours would frequently yield to nothing less powerful +than sandpaper. + +I need scarcely say that sandpaper was not supplied by the deities of +the Dry Store. Sandpaper did not come within their purview. It had no +recognised use in hospital. Therefore it did not exist. But, observing +that a succession of metal pudding-basins would be an insupportable +prospect without sandpaper, I laid in a stock of sandpaper, paying for +the same out of my own private purse. It was a cheap investment. Never +have earnings of mine been better spent. Moreover, having once hit on +the notion of giving myself a lift illegitimately, so to speak, I added +to the smuggling-in of sandpaper a secret purchase of soda. Except that +our scrub-ladies, each and all, discovering that the Dry Store's +allowance of this priceless chemical had at last apparently been +generous, caused it to fly at a disconcerting pace, and as a result +sometimes left me short of it, my career as a washer-up afterwards +became more comfortable. + +I shall never like washing-up. In the communal households of the future +I shall heave coal, sift cinders, dig potatoes, dust furniture or scour +floors--any task will be mine which, though it makes me dirty, does not +make me greasily dirty. But if I must wash-up, if I must study the +idiosyncrasies of cold fat, treacly plates, frying-pans which have +sizzled dripping-toast on the gas-ring, frozen gravy, and pudding-basins +with burnt milk-skins filmed to their sides, I shall be comparatively +undismayed. For sandpaper is not yet (like the news posters) abolished; +and soda--although I hear its price has risen several hundred per +cent.--is still cheaper than, say, diamonds. + + + + +IV + +A "HUT" HOSPITAL + + +People have curious ideas of the kind of building which would make a +good war hospital. "The So-and-So Club in Pall Mall," I have been told, +"should have been commandeered long ago. Ideal for hospital purposes. Of +course some of the M.P. members brought influence to bear, and the War +Office was choked off...." And so forth. + +It would surprise me to hear of anything that the War Office was held +back from doing if it wanted to do it. Perhaps the least likely +obstructionist to be successful in this project would be a +club-frequenting M.P. The War Office has taken exactly and precisely +what it chose--even when it would have been better to choose otherwise. +In this matter of commandeering buildings for hospitals it may or may +not have acted with wisdom; but at least it has been safe in avoiding +the advice of the individual who jumps to the conclusion that just any +pleasingly-situated edifice will do, provided beds and nurses are +shovelled into it in sufficient quantities. + +The indignant patriot who was convinced that chicane alone saved the +So-and-So Club from being dedicated to the service of the wounded was +quite unable to tell me whether the lifts--assuming that lifts +existed--were roomy enough to accommodate stretchers; whether, if so, no +interval of stairs prevented trollies from being wheeled to every ward; +whether the arrangement of the building would allow of the network of +plumbing necessitated by the introduction of numerous bathrooms and +lavatories (for each ward must possess both); whether the kitchens were +so located that they could supply food to top-floor patients without +waste of carrying labour on the part of the orderlies' staff. These +problems, the mere fringe of the subject, had never occurred to our +patriot. His idea of a hospital was a place where soldiers lie in bed +and get well. (What queer notions visitors absorb of the _easiness_ of +hospital life!) He had not glimpsed the organisation which made the cure +possible. The man in bed, a Sister hovering in the background with, +apparently, nothing to do but look pleasant--these constituted, for him, +the final phenomena of a war hospital. These phenomena, instead of being +housed in a wood-and-corrugated-iron shed, might have been staged +picturesquely in one of the luxurious salons of the So-and-So Club in +Pall Mall. It was a shame that they weren't. He would write to the +papers about it. Somebody must be blamed, somebody must be made to +hustle. And meanwhile the Sisters and doctors who _were_ installed in +gorgeous mansions for their work were openly envying the fortunate ones +who had been given those bare but efficient and compactly-planned sheds. + +Some years ago a number of public buildings were earmarked for hospital +use in case of war. It may surprise the indignant patriots to learn that +any preparations whatever were made prior to the outbreak in 1914. +Nevertheless all kinds of preparations actually were made. Mistakes and +miscalculations may have marred those preparations: the fact remains +that, as far as the Territorial Medical Service was concerned, the +authorities had merely to press a button and hospitals came into +existence. Thus a number of institutions--mostly schools--found +themselves ejected from their own roof-trees: found, in short, (what +many other folk were to learn later) that the State is omnipotent in +war-time and that sectional interests fade into insignificance compared +with the interests of the safety of the commonwealth. Some conception of +the promptness with which this paper scheme of Sir Alfred Keogh's +materialised at the outbreak of war may be gathered from the simple +statement that the building of which I myself write was an Orphans' Home +on August 4th, 1914. At 6 a.m. on August 5th it was a military hospital. + +I do not say that it was a military hospital in working order. But if, +by a miracle, wounded _had_ turned up then, there was at least a staff +of medical officers and orderlies on the premises to receive them. In +point of fact it was some weeks before the first patients arrived. Those +weeks, however, were not idle ones. The layman who considers that any +large building can be turned instantaneously into a hospital would have +had an eye-opener if he had witnessed the work done here. The mere +removing of 95 per cent. of the institution's furniture was a colossal +task; added thereto was the introduction of hundreds of beds, hundreds +of mattresses, hundreds of sets of bedclothes, hundreds of suits of +pyjamas, hundreds of--But why prolong a brain-racking list? Then there +was the pulling-down and fixing-up of partitions, the removal of every +single window for replacement by Hopper sashes, the fitting-in of +bathrooms, lavatories, ward-kitchens, sink-rooms, dispensary, cookhouse, +operating-theatre, pathological laboratory, linen-store, steward's +store, clothing-store, detention-room, administration offices, X-ray +department ... all these in a building which, spacious and handsome +outwardly, was, as to its interior, a characteristic maze in the +Scottish baronial style of architecture beloved by mid-Victorian +philanthropists. How the evicted orphans will like to return to those +stone-flagged passages and large airy dormitories, after having +experienced the comforts of the banal but snug suburban villas in which +they are at present located, I know not. There is a certain dignity +about the Scottish baronial pile, I admit. The silhouette of its grey +stone facade, rising above delightful lawns, makes a good +impression--from a distance. Postcard views of it sell freely to +visitors. But the best part of our hospital is hidden behind that +turreted facade, and is much too "ugly" and utilitarian for postcard +immortalisation. + +The best part of our hospital--_the_ hospital, to most of us--came into +being when the commandeered Scottish baronial orphans' asylum was found +to be too small. Then were built "the huts." + +The word "hut" suggests something casual, of the camping-out order: a +shed knocked together with tin-tacks, doubtfully weather-proof and +probably scamped by profiteering contractors. Of the huts provided at +certain training centres this may have been true. The finely austere +and efficient ranks of hut-wards which constitute the main part of the +3rd London General Hospital are the very antithesis of that picture. +They may look flimsy. They were certainly put up at a remarkable pace. I +myself witnessed the erection of the final fifty of them. An open field +vanished in less than a month, and "Bungalow Town" (as someone nicknamed +it) appeared. You would have said that such speed meant countless +imperfections of detail. No doubt some tinkerings and modifications were +bound to follow, when the regiment of workmen, carpenters, engineers, +drainage specialists, electricians, had vanished. But, in the long run, +the ideal hospital remained--a hospital with which the So-and-So Club in +Pall Mall, for all its luxuriousness, could never hope to compare. + +There are still a dozen wards--used mostly for medical cases--in the +Scottish baronial building. Its rooms, too, provide the Administration +with offices. Its great Dining Hall is a splendid Receiving Ward for the +sorting-out and clearance of newly-arrived convoys of patients. We +should be poorly situated indeed if we had not our Scottish baronial +main building to be the hub of the hospital's activities, or rather the +handle from which springs the fan of the hospital's great extension--the +huts. Approaching the hospital the visitor sees nothing of those huts. +As he walks up the drive he flatters himself that he has reached his +destination. He discovers his mistake when, at the inquiry bureau in the +entrance, he is informed that the patient whom he has come to interview +is (say) in "C 13." He is advised to go down the passage on his left, +turn to his right, turn to the left again and then again to the +right--after which he had better seek a further re-direction. Launching +himself optimistically on this voyage he learns, long ere he has +attained his goal, that a modern war-hospital can hide a considerable +extent of pedestrianism behind a comparatively short Scottish baronial +frontage. He will be fortunate if five minutes' steady tramping brings +him to the bedside of his friend in C 13. + +Perhaps he will content himself in his footsoreness by noting that, to +reach C 13, he has not had to go up or down any stairs. This is one of +the beauties of the hut system. It consumes a big area, but it is all +on one level--the ground level. The patient on crutches can go anywhere +without fear of tripping, the patient in a wheeled chair can propel +himself anywhere, the orderlies can push wheeled stretchers or +dinner-wagons anywhere. Our visitor for C 13, having escaped from the +back of the Scottish baronial building, emerges into a vista of covered +corridors, wooden-floored, galvanised-iron roofed. It is a heartbreaking +vista to the poor woman who has had no bus-fare and is burdened by a +baby in arms. It is a vista which seems to have no end. Corridor +branches out of corridor--A Corridor, B Corridor, C Corridor, D +Corridor, each with its perspective of doors opening into wards; and +shorter corridors leading to store-rooms and the like. But the patient +or orderly who has dwelt in a hospital where, though distances are +shorter, staircases are involved--or where every trifling +coming-and-going of goods or stretchers necessitates the manipulation of +a lift--blesses those level, smooth corridors, with their facile access +to any ward, to operating theatres, kitchens, stores, X-ray room, +massage department, etc., and their stepless exit into the open air. + +Looked at from outside, a hut-ward is--to the aesthetic eye--a hideous +structure. Knowing what it stands for, the science, the tenderness and +the fundamental civilisation which it represents, we may descry, behind +its stark geometrical outlines, a real nobility and beauty. Entering a +typical hut-ward you behold thirty beds, fifteen on each side of the +room. Between each pair of beds is a locker in which the patient stows +his belongings. (Woe betide him if his locker is not kept neat!) In the +central aisle of the room are the Sister's writing-table, certain other +tables, chairs, and two coke stoves for heating purposes in winter. The +floor is carpetless, and maintained in a meticulous state of high gloss +by means of daily polishings. At a height of a few feet from the floor, +the asbestos-lined walls cease and become windows. There is no gap in +the continuous line of windows all down each side of the ward--a special +type of window which, even when open, declines to allow rain to enter. +In consequence of these windows the ward is not only very well lit, but +also airy and odourless. When all the windows are open (which is the +case throughout the entire summer and generally the case in winter also) +the patient has the advantages of indoor comfort plus an outdoor +atmosphere. At the end of the ward a covered verandah is spacious enough +to take an extra couple of beds for those requiring completely open-air +treatment. + +The ward proper has certain additions: a kitchen with gas-stove and +geyser; a sink-room with geyser and cleansing apparatus of special +pattern; a bathroom with geyser; lavatories; a small room for the +isolation of a patient on the danger-list; a linen-room; and cupboards. +All these are packed neatly under that one rectangular corrugated roof +which looked so ugly and so unpromising from outside. + +Do not pity the wounded soldier because he is quartered in a "hut." The +word sounds unattractive. But if it is the right kind of hut, he is in +the soundest and most sanitary type of temporary hospital that the mind +of man has yet devised. The rain-drops may rattle a shade noisily on the +roof, the asbestos lining may be devoid of ornamentation, but as he +lies in bed and contemplates that unadorned ceiling he is a deal better +off than if he were gazing at the elaborate (and dust-harbouring) +cornices of the So-and-So Club's grandiose smoking-lounge in Pall Mall. + + + + +V + +FROM THE "D" BLOCK WARDS + + +If you walk up the corridor at half-past four on certain afternoons of +the week you will meet a mob of patients trooping from their wards to +the concert-room. Being built of wood and corrugated iron, the corridor +is an echoing cave of noises. It echoes the tramp of feet--and +army-pattern boots were not soled for silence. It echoes the thud-thud +of crutches. It echoes the slurred rumble of wheeled chairs and +stretcher-trollies. But, above all, at half-past four on concert days it +echoes happy talk and chaff and boisterous laughter. + +As often as not, the loudest talk, the cheeriest chaff, the most +spontaneous laughter, emanate from the blue-clad stalwarts who have +mustered from the "D" Block wards. + +"D" Block contains the wards for eye-wound cases. + +Here they come, a string of them, mostly with bandages round their +heads. The leading man owns one good eye--a twinkling eye--an eye of +mischief--an eye (you would guess at once) for the girls. (But the eye's +owner probably calls them the "pushers." Such is our language now.) +Behind him, in single file, and in step with him, march a gang of +patients each with his hand on the shoulder of the man in front. Tramp, +tramp! Their tread is purposely thunderous on the bare boards of the +corridor. They sing as they advance. It is a ragtime chorus whose most +memorable line runs, "You never seem to kiss me in the same place +twice." A jaunty lilt, to be sure, both in tune and in rhythm. Tramp, +tramp! The one-eyed leader swerves round a corner, roaring the refrain. +His followers swerve too. Suddenly the Matron is encountered, emerging +from her room. "Fine afternoon, Matron!" The leader interrupts his chant +to utter this hearty greeting. And, with one voice, "Fine afternoon, +Matron!" exclaim his followers. But they do not turn their heads. Each +with his hand resting on the shoulder of the man in front they go +steadily on, towards the concert-room, with an odd intentness, glancing +neither to one side nor the other. For though, at their leader's cue, +they have hailed the Matron, they have not seen her. They are blind. + +The spectacle of men--particularly young men--who have given their sight +for their country is, to most observers, a moving one. Melancholy are +the reflections of the visitor who meets, for the first time, a +promenading party of our blind patients. It is the plain truth, +nevertheless, that the blind men themselves are far from melancholy. One +of the rowdiest characters we ever had in the hospital was totally +blind. The blind men's wards are notoriously amongst the least sedate. I +offer no explanation. I simply state the fact. I will fortify it by an +anecdote. + +It came to pass that eight complimentary tickets for a Queen's Hall +matinee were received by the Matron, who in due course allotted them to +seven "D" Block patients. An orderly, detailed to take them to the +hall, completed the octette. Corporal Smith, the orderly in question, +recounted his adventures afterwards. "Never again," quoth he, "shall I +jump at a matinee job if there are blind chaps in the party. They're the +deuce." + +You must understand that we hospital orderlies regard the task of +shepherding patients to an entertainment in town as an agreeable form of +holiday. I have had some very pleasant outings of that sort myself. But +not--I am thankful to recall, in the light of Corporal Smith's +narrative--with blind men. One-legged men are often a sufficient care, +in manoeuvring on and off omnibuses. Apparently helpless cripples have +a marvellous gift for losing themselves, entering wrong trains, and +generally escaping--as the hour for return draws nigh--from one's +custody. And the city seems to be full of lunatics ready to supply +alcohol or indigestible refreshments to the most delicate war-hospital +inmates. Even with ordinary patients the orderly's afternoon excursion +is sometimes not unfraught with anxiety. But blind patients, as Corporal +Smith said, are the deuce. + +Out of his party, four were totally blind, two could recognise dimly +the difference between light and darkness, and one had a single good +eye. + +Queen's Hall was reached, by bus, without mishap. After the performance +there was tea at an A.B.C. shop. Here Jock, one of the totally blind +men, a Scotchman--all Scots are "Jocks" in the army--distinguished +himself by facetiae (audible throughout the whole shop) on the English +pronunciation of the word 'scone,' and intimated his desire to treat the +company to a ballad. This project was suppressed, but "a silly fool in a +top hat threatened to report me for having given my men drink," said +Corporal Smith. "Jock gave _him_ the bird, not 'arf. But I thought it +about time to be going home." + +So the party prepared to go home. + +The bus was voted dull. Somebody suggested the tube. Corporal Smith +consented. + +He had forgotten that at Oxford Circus station the lifts have been +abolished in favour of sliding staircases. Confronted by the escalator, +Corporal Smith halted his party and informed them that they must walk +down by the ordinary stair. The escalator was not safe for blind men. +Unfortunately, Jock had sniffed a lark; the one-eyed man backed him up; +the party--elated perhaps by their tea--would not hear of anything so +humdrum as a descent by the ordinary stair. They were going on the +sliding stair. They insisted. Corporal Smith argued in vain. In vain he +exerted his (purely nominal) authority. His charges mocked him. The +one-eyed man leading, with Jock in his wake, they launched themselves at +the sliding stair. In sheer desperation Corporal Smith brought up the +rear, supporting two of the more timid venturers as best he might. None +of the group except Corporal Smith himself, as it turned out, had ever +travelled on an escalator before. But they had heard a comic song about +a sliding stair, and they wished--Jock especially--to sample this +metropolitan invention. + +By dodging forward to place each blind man's hand upon the banister, +Corporal Smith managed to send off his patients without a stumble. But +as the stair inexorably lowered them into the bowels of the earth he +realised, only too vividly, what might happen at the foot of the +descent. The evening rush of suburb-bound passengers had begun and the +staircase was rather crowded. Nobody seemed to realise that the +khaki-overcoated men who stood so still upon the steps were not the +usual hospital convalescents out on leave and able to look after +themselves. Corporal Smith, delayed by one man who had hesitated at the +top before taking the plunge, beheld his charges below him, hopelessly +dotted, at intervals, amongst the general public. It was impossible for +him to struggle down ahead, to the bottom of the staircase, to guide the +men off as they arrived. This task, he hoped, would be adequately +performed by the one-eyed man. + +It might have been. The one-eyed man was game for anything. But Jock, +arriving in the highest good humour at the bottom of the staircase, was +tilted sideways by the curve, and promptly sat down on the +landing-place. Instead of rising, he proclaimed aloud that this was +funnier even than England's pronunciation of the word 'scone.' +Whereupon various hurrying passengers, including an old lady, tripped +over his prone form. The sensation of being kicked and sat upon appealed +to Jock's sense of humour. The more people avalanched across him the +more comic he thought it. And in a moment there was quite a pile of +wriggling bodies on top of him. For though the public managed on the +whole to leap over, or circumvent, the obstacle presented by Jock's +extremely large body, none of his blind comrades did so. + +"Every single one of them fell flop," said Corporal Smith; "I give you +my word." + +But were they downhearted? No! They regarded this mysterious hurly-burly +of arms and legs as a capital jest. So far from being alarmed or +annoyed, they shouted with glee. The old lady, who had gathered herself +together and was directing a stream of voluble reproof at Corporal Smith +for his "callousness and cruelty to these unhappy blind heroes," retired +discomfited. Jock's comments routed her more effectively than the +Corporal's assurance that the episode was none of his choosing. + +The party at last sorted itself out and was placed upon its feet once +more. It was excessively pleased with its exploit. Hilarity reigned. +Corporal Smith, relieved, made ready to conduct his squad to the +platform. + +Alas, a bright idea occurred to Jock. Why not go up the other sliding +stair and down again? + +Agreed, _nem. con._ At least, Corporal Smith's _con._ was too futile to +be worth counting. + +"I had to go with the blighters," said he. "There was no end of a crowd +by this time. And Jock and some of the others fell over at the top +again. And there was a row with the ticket-collector. And people kept +saying they'd report me. _Me!_ And when I'd got my party down to the +bottom for the second time, and some of the tube officials had come and +said they couldn't allow it and we must buzz off home, I lined the +fellows up to march 'em to the train, and dash me if two weren't +missing. They'd given me the slip." + +The two truants, it may be added, could not be found. Corporal Smith +had to return without them. At a late hour of the evening they appeared, +not an atom repentant, at the hospital, having persuaded someone to put +them into the correct bus. One of them, Jock, explained that, being from +the North, he had desired to seize this opportunity of seeing the sights +of London. Jock, I may remind you, is totally blind. Jock's guide, the +man who had volunteered to show him the sights and who had only once +been in London before, could see very faintly the difference between +light and dark.... Thus this pair of irresponsibles had fared forth into +the dusk of Regent Street. + + * * * * * + +It sounds a very horrible fate to be blinded. But somehow the blind men +themselves seldom seem to be overwhelmed by its horribleness. If you +want to hear the merriest banter in a war hospital, visit the blind +men's wards. The pathos of them lies less in the sadness of the victims +than in the triumphant, wonderful fact that they are _not_ sad. I wish +we others all inhabited the same mysteriously jocund spiritual realm as +Jock and his comrades, who come tramp-tramping to the concert-room down +the corridor from the D wards. + + + + +VI + +WHEN THE WOUNDED ARRIVE + + +The receiving hall of the hospital is its clearing house of patients. It +is a huge room, with a lofty and echoing roof, a little in the style of +a church. Before the war, when the building was a school, this rather +grandiose apartment no doubt witnessed speechifyings and prize +distributions. May the time be not far distant when it will once again +be used for those observances! Meanwhile its vast floor is occupied by +ranks of beds. + +Those beds are generally untenanted. Visitors who, like the lady in the +play, have taken the wrong turning, are apt to find themselves in the +receiving hall, and, gazing at its array of vacant beds, have been known +to conclude that the hospital was empty. (As if any war-hospital, in +these times, could be empty!) But our patients have only a short +acquaintanceship with the receiving-hall beds: these beds are momentary +resting-places on their journey healthwards: they are not meant to lie +in but to lie _on_. The three-score wards for which the receiving hall +is the clearing house are the real destination of the patients; down +long corridors, in wards far cosier because less ornate than this, the +patient will find "his" bed ready for him, the bed which he is not to +lie on but _in_. + +We orderlies meet each convoy at the front door of the hospital. The +walking-cases are the first to arrive--men who are either not ill +enough, or not badly enough wounded, to need to be put on stretchers in +ambulances. They come from the station in motor-cars supplied by that +indefatigable body, the London Ambulance Column. The walking-case +alights from his car, is conducted into the receiving hall, and ten +minutes later is in the bathroom. For the ritual of the bath must on no +account be omitted--although now not so obviously imperative as in the +early period of the war. Few patients reach us who have not first +sojourned, either for a day or two or for weeks, in hospitals in France. +They are therefore merely travel-stained, as you or I might be +travel-stained after coming over from Dublin to Euston. The bath is thus +a pleasure more than a necessity. Whereas there _was_ an era, when our +guests came straight from only too populous trenches.... + +"O.C. Baths," as the bathroom orderly was nicknamed, had to be +circumspect in the performance of his job. + +The few minutes which the walking-case spends in the receiving hall are +occupied (1) in drinking a cup of cocoa, and (2) in "having his +particulars taken." + +Poor soul!--he is weary of giving his "particulars." He has had to give +them half-a-dozen times at least, perhaps more, since he left the front. +At the field dressing-station they wanted his particulars, at the +clearing-station, on the train, at the base hospital, on another train, +on the steamer, on the next train, and now in this English hospital. As +he sits and comforts himself with cocoa, a "V.A.D." hovers at his +elbow, intent on a printed sheet, the details of which she is rapidly +filling-in with a pencil. For this is a card-index war, a colossal +business of files and classifications and ledgers and statistics and +registrations, an undertaking on a scale beside which Harrod's and +Whiteley's and Selfridge's and Wanamaker's and the Magazin du Louvre, +all rolled into one, would be a fleabite of simplicity. Ere the morrow +shall have dawned, our patient's military biography will be recounted, +by various clerks, in I don't know how many different entries. If you +are curious, refer to one of our volumes of the _Admission and Discharge +Book: Field Service Army Book 27a_. Open it at any of its +closely-written pages and see the host of ruled columns which the +orderly in charge of it must inscroll with reference to each of the many +thousands of patients who pass through our hospital per annum. The +columns ask for his Regiment; Squadron, Battery or Company; Number; +Rank; Surname; Christian Name; Age; Length of Service; Completed Months +with Field Force; Diseases (wounds and injuries are expressed by a +number indicating their nature and whereabouts); Date of Admission; Date +of Discharge or Transfer; Number of Days under Treatment; Number of +Ward; Religion; and "Observations"--a space usually occupied by the name +of the hospital ship upon which our friend crossed the Channel, and the +name of the convalescent home to which he went on bidding us adieu. + +Having furnished the preliminary statements which lay the foundation of +this compendious memoir, the walking-case thankfully finishes his cocoa, +picks up the package of "blues" which has been put at his side, and +departs, with his fellows, to the bathroom. Here he is tackled by the +Pack Store orderlies, who take from him, and enter in their books, his +khaki clothes. These he must leave in exchange for the blue slop uniform +which, _pro tem._, is to be his only wear. When he emerges from the +bathroom he is attired in what is now England's most honourable +livery--the royal blue of the war-hospital patient. And (though perhaps +the matter is not mentioned to him in so many words) his own suit is +already ticketed with an identification label and on its way to the +fumigator. This is no reflection on the owner of the suit ... but there +are some things we don't talk about. Mr. Fumigator-Wallah is not the +least busy of the more retiring members of a war-hospital staff. He is +not in the limelight; but you might come to be very sad and sorry if he +took it into his head to neglect his unapplauded part off-stage. + +The walking-cases are still splashing and dressing in the bathroom when +the ambulances with the cot-cases begin to appear. Now is the orderlies' +busy time. Each stretcher must be quickly but gently removed from the +ambulance and carried into the receiving hall. + +Four orderlies haul the stretcher from its shelf in the ambulance; two +orderlies then take its handles and carry it indoors. At the entrance to +the receiving hall they halt. The Medical Officer bends over the +patient, glances at the label which is attached to him, and assigns him +to a ward. (Certain types of cases go to certain groups of wards.) The +attendant sergeant promptly picks a metal ticket from a rack and lays +it on the stretcher. The ticket has, punched on it, the number of the +patient's ward and the number of the patient's bed in that ward. This +ceremony completed, the orderlies proceed, with their burden, up the +aisle between the beds in the receiving hall. + +Arrived at the bed, they lower their stretcher until it is at such a +level that the patient, if he is active enough, can move off it on to +the bed; if he is too weak to help himself he is lifted on to the bed by +orderlies under the direction of the receiving-hall Sister. The +stretcher is promptly removed and restored to its ambulance. If the +patient is in an exceptionally suffering condition he is not placed on +the receiving-hall bed; instead--the Medical Officer having given his +permission--his stretcher is put on a wheeled trolley and he is taken +straight away to his ward, so that he will only undergo one shift of +position between the ambulance and his destination. The majority of +stretcher-cases, however, reach us in a by no means desperate state, +for, as I say, they seldom come to England without having been treated +previously at a base abroad (except during the periods of heavy +fighting). And it is remarkable how often the patient refuses help in +getting off the stretcher on to the bed. He may be a cocoon of bandages, +but he will courageously heave himself overboard, from stretcher to bed, +with a gay _wallop_ which would be deemed rash even in a person in +perfect health. Our receiving hall, at a big intake of wounded, when +every bed bears its poor victim of the war, presents a spectacle which +might give the philosopher food for thought; but I suspect that, if he +regarded its actualities rather than his own preconceptions, what would +impress him more than the sadness would be on the one hand the +kindliness, brisk but not officious, of the staff, and on the other the +spontaneous geniality of the battered occupants of the beds. The +orderlies can spare little time for talk, but the few chats which they +are able to have with patients whom they are helping to change their +clothes, or to whom they are proffering the inevitable cocoa (which is +a cocktail, as it were, prior to the meal which will be served in the +men's own ward), are punctuated by jokes and laughter rather than the +long-visaged "sympathy" which the outsider might--quite wrongly!--have +pictured as appropriate to such an assemblage. + +The stretcher-case, before he is taken to his ward, must also "give his +particulars," must also be interviewed by the Pack Store officials, and +must also have assigned to him his blue uniform (wherewith are a shirt, +a cravat, slippers and socks) in anticipation of the time when he shall +be able to use his feet again and promenade our corridors and grounds. +He receives the customary packet of cigarettes (probably the second, for +he often gets one at the railway station too), and then, on another +stretcher, mounted on a trolley, is wheeled off to his ward. Here, +bestowed in bed at last, we leave him to his blanket-bath, his meal, his +temperature-taking and chart filling-in by the Sister, his visit from +the doctor, and all the rest of it. For the moment we see no more of +him; we must race back to the receiving hall, and, if there are no more +patients to take away, return the trolley to its proper nook, put +straight the blankets and pillows on the beds, sweep the floor, and tidy +up generally, in readiness for the next convoy's advent. + +Presently the huge room, beneath its dim arched ceiling, is silent and +empty once more. The four ranks of beds, without a crease on their brown +blankets, are bare of occupants. The Sister and her probationers have +vanished. The Pack Store orderlies have carried off their loot of dirty +khaki tunics and trousers for the fumigator. The clerical V.A.D.'s have +gone to enter "particulars" in ledgers and card-indices. The cookhouse +people have removed their cocoa urn. The sergeant is inspecting the +metal ward-tickets left in his rack. A glance at them tells him how many +beds, and which beds, are free in the hospital; for the tickets have no +duplicates; any given ticket can only reappear in the rack when the bed +which it connotes is out of use and awaiting a newcomer; the ticket +hangs from a nail in the wall beside the patient's bed just so long as +that bed is tenanted. So the rack of metal tickets might almost take the +place of that important document, of which a freshly-compiled edition is +typed every morning, the Empty Bed List; and the sergeant is meditative +as he sorts into the rack the tickets which have newly been sent in from +the Sisters of wards where there have been departures. "Not much room in +the eye-wound wards," he ponders; or, "A lot of empties in the +medicals." And then ... the tinkle of the telephone.... + +"Another convoy expected at 6.15? Twenty walking-cases and seventeen +cots. Right you are!" + +And at 6.15 the party of orderlies will be back again at the front door, +again the motor-cars will stream up the drive, again the ambulances will +come with their stretchers, and again the receiving hall will awaken +from its interlude of silence to echo with the activities incidental to +a clearing house of those damaged human bundles which are the _raison +d'etre_ of our great war-hospital. + + + + +VII + +"T.... A...." + + +War-hospital patients are of many sorts. It is a common mistake of the +arm-chair newspaper devourer to lump all soldiers together as quaint, +bibulous, aitch-dropping innocents, lamblike and gauche in +drawing-rooms, fierce and picturesque on the field, who (to judge by +their published photographs) are continually on the grin and continually +shaking hands either with each other or with equally grinsome French +peasant women at cottage doors or with the local mayor who congratulates +them on the glorious V.C.'s which, of course, they are continually +winning. In a war hospital that harbours many thousands of patients per +annum, we should know, in the long run, something about the +characteristics of Tommy Atkins; and it is with resentment that I hear +him thus classified as a mere type. He is not a type. Discipline and +training have given him some veneer of generalised similarities. Beneath +these, Tommy Atkins is simply the man in the street--any man in any +street; and if you look out of your window in the city and see a throng +of pedestrians upon the pavement you might just as well say that because +they are all civilians they are all alike as that, because all soldiers +wear khaki, they are all alike. + +I have a quarrel with the Press on the score of its persistent fostering +of this notion that "our gallant lads" (as the sentimental scribe calls +them) are a pack of children about whose exploits an unfailing stream of +semi-pathetic, semi-humorous anecdotes must be put forth. Even the old +professional army exhibited no dead level either of blackguards on the +one hand or humble Galahads on the other. But whatever may have been the +case before the war, all the armies of Europe are now alike in this, +that they are composed of civilians who merely happen to have adopted a +certain garb for the performance of a certain job--and, be it remarked, +a temporary job. That garb has not reduced the citizens, who have the +honour to wear it, to a monotonous level either of intelligence or of +conduct: nor even of opinions about the war itself. I have had +fire-eaters in my ward who breathed the sentiments of _John Bull_ and +the _Evening News_, and I have had pacifists (they seemed to have fought +no less bravely) who, week by week, read and approved Mr. Snowden in the +_Labour Leader_; I have had Radicals and Tories, and patients who cared +for neither party, but whose passion was cage-birds or boxing or amateur +photography; I have had patients who were sulky and patients who were +bright, patients who were unlettered and patients who were educated, +patients who could hardly express themselves without the use of an +ensanguined vocabulary and patients who were gently spoken and +fastidious. Each of them was Tommy Atkins--the inanely smirking hero of +the picture-paper and the funny paragraph. Neither his picture nor the +paragraph may be positively a lie, and yet, when the arm-chair dweller +chucklingly draws attention to them, I am tempted to relapse into +irreverence and utter one or other (or perhaps both) of two phrases +which T. Atkins is himself credited with using _ad nauseam_--"Na-poo" +and "I _don't_ think." + +When I assert--as I do unhesitatingly assert--that no one could work in +a war-hospital ward for any length of time without an ever-deepening +respect and fondness for Tommy Atkins, it is the same thing as asserting +that the respect and fondness are evoked by close contact with one's +countrymen: nothing more nor less. A hospital ward is a haphazard +selection of one's fellow-Britons: the most wildly haphazard it is +possible to conceive. And the pessimistic cynic who, after a sojourn in +that changing company for a month or two can still either generalise +about them or (if he does) can still not acknowledge that in the mass +they are amazingly lovable, is beyond hope. The war has taught its +lessons to us all, and none more important than this. For myself I +confess that I never knew before how nice were nine out of ten of the +individuals with whom I sat silent in trains, whom I glanced at in +business offices or behind counters, whom I saw in workshops or in the +field or who were my neighbours in music-halls. They were strangers. In +the years to come I hope they will be strangers no longer. For they and +I have dressed alike and borne the same surname--Atkins. + +Of course, there remain a few generalisations which _can_ safely be +risked about even so nondescript a person as the new Tommy Atkins. As +practically all the Tommy Atkinses are, at this moment, concentrated on +the prosecution of one great job, it is natural that their main +interests should revolve round that job. They all (for instance) want +the job to be finished. They all (within my experience) want it to be +finished well. They nearly all desire earnestly to cease soldiering as +soon as the job _is_ finished well. I never yet met the man (though he +may exist, outside the brains of the scribes aforementioned) who, having +tasted the joys of roughing it, is determined not to return to a humdrum +desk in an office: on the contrary, that office and that humdrum desk +have now become this travelled adventurer's most roseate dream. I have +conversed with patients drawn from nearly every walk in life, and I do +not remember one who definitely spoke of refusing to go back to his +former work--if he could get it. + +One of my patients had been a subterranean lavatory attendant. You would +have thought his ambitions--after visits to Egypt, Malta, the +Dardanelles and France--might have soared to loftier altitudes. He had +survived hair-raising adventures; he had taken part in the making of +history; although wounded he had not been incapacitated for an active +career in the future; and he was neither illiterate nor unintelligent. +Yet he told me, with obvious satisfaction, that his place was being kept +open for him. I was, as it were, invited to rejoice with him over the +destiny which was his. I may add that the singular revelations which he +imparted as to the opportunities for extra earnings in his troglodyte +trade extorted from me a more enthusiastic sympathy than might be +supposed possible. + +That agreeable domestic pet, _homo sapiens_, remains unchanged even when +you dress him up in a uniform and set him fighting. He is always +consistently inconsistent; he is always both reasonable and +unreasonable. You can try to cast him in a mould, but he resumes his +normal shapelessness the moment the mould is removed. Expose him to +frightful ordeals of terror and pain, and he will emerge grumbling about +some petty grievance or carrying on a flirtation with another man's wife +or squabbling about sectarian dogmas or gambling on magazine +competitions or planning new businesses--in fact, behaving precisely as +the natural lord of creation always does behave. No member of our +hospital staff, I imagine, will ever forget the arrival of the first +batch of exchanged British wounded prisoners; It was the most tragic +scene I have ever witnessed. It is a fact, for which I make no apology, +that tears were shed by some of those whose task it was to welcome that +pitiful band of martyrs. We had received convoys of wounded many a time, +but _these_ broken creatures, so pale, so neglected, so thin and so +infinitely happy to be free once more, had a poignant appeal which must +have melted the most rigid official. (And we are neither very official, +here, nor very rigid.) Well, amongst these liberated captives was one +who told a sad tale of starvation at his internment camp. There is +little doubt that it was a true tale, in the main. On that I make no +comment. I simply introduce you to this gentleman, who had been restored +to his native land after ten months of entombment, in order to mention +that on the following morning, when his breakfast was placed before him, +he turned up his nose at it. Loudly complaining of the poorness of the +food, he leant out of bed, picked up a brown-paper parcel which had been +his only luggage, and produced from it some German salted herring, which +he proceeded to eat with grumbling gusto. + +That is not specially Tommy Atkins; it is _homo sapiens_ of the +hearthside, whether in suburban villa or in slum, for ever dissatisfied +(more especially with his victuals) and for ever evoking our affection +all the same. + +No; Tommy Atkins is never twice alike. He is unanimous on few debatable +matters. One of them, as I have said, is the desirability of finishing +the war--in the proper way. (But even here there are differences as to +what constitutes the proper way.) Another is (I trust I shall not shock +the reader) the extreme displeasingness of life at the front. I would +not say that our hospital patients are positively thankful to be +wounded, nor that they do not wish to recover with reasonable rapidity. +But that they are glad to be safe in England once more is undeniable. +The more honour to them that few, if any, flinch from returning to +duty--when they know only too well what that duty consists of. But they +make no bones about their opinion. Not long ago I was the conductor of a +party of convalescents who went to a special matinee of a military +drama. The theatre was entirely filled with wounded soldiers from +hospitals, plus a few nurses and orderlies. It was an inspiring sight. +The drama went well, and its patriotic touches received their due meed +of applause. But when the heroine, in a moving passage, declared that +she had never met a wounded British soldier who was not eager to get +back to the front, there arose, in an instant, a spontaneous shout of +laughter from the whole audience. That was Tommy Atkins unanimous for +once. + +He was unanimous too, I should add, in perceiving immediately that the +actress had been disconcerted by his roar of amusement. The poor girl's +emotional speech had been ruined. She looked blank and stood irresolute. +At once a burst of hand-clapping took the place of the laughter. It was +not ironical, it was friendly and apologetic. "Go ahead!" it said. +"We're sorry. Those lines aren't your fault, anyway. You spoke them very +prettily, and it was a shame to laugh. But the ass of a playwright +hadn't been in the trenches, and if your usual audiences relish that +kind of speech they haven't been there either." + +So much for Tommy Atkins in his unanimous mood--unanimously condemning +cant and at the same time unanimously courteous. Now that I come to +reflect I believe that, in his best moments, these are perhaps the only +two points concerning which Tommy Atkins _is_ unanimous. Whether he +lives up to them or not (and to expect him unflinchingly to live up to +them in season and out of season is about as sensible as to expect him +perpetually to live up to the photographs and anecdotes), we may take +them as his ideal. He dislikes humbug: he tries to be polite. Could one +sketch a sounder scaffolding on which to build all the odd +divergencies--crankinesses and heroisms, stupidities and +engagingnesses--which may go to make the edifice of an average decent +soul's material, mental and spiritual habitation? + + * * * * * + +_Postscript._--An expert--one of England's greatest experts--who has +read the above tells me that I have not done justice to the old +professional army men of Mons and the Aisne. When wounded and in our +hospital they _did_ want to go back to fight. But their sole reason, +given with frankness, was that they considered they were needed: the new +army, in training, was not ready: it would be murder to send the new +army out, unprepared, to such an ordeal. + +This authority, who has interviewed many thousands of convalescents, +further remarked: "The wounded man who has been under shell fire and who +professes to be eager to go back, whether ordered or no, is a liar. On +the other hand, the scrim-shankers who try to get out of going back, +when they should go back, are an amazingly small minority." + + + + +VIII + +LAUNDRY PROBLEMS + + +A number of oddly unmasculine duties fell to the lot of the R.A.M.C. +orderly prior to the time when "V.A.D.'s" were allowed to take his place +(at least to some extent) throughout our English war-hospitals. One of +my first tasks in the morning was the collecting and classification of +my ward's dirty linen. The work cannot be called difficult. It would be +an exaggeration to say that it demands a supreme intellectual effort. +But to the male mind it is, at least, rather novel. The average bachelor +has perhaps been accustomed to scrutinise his collars, handkerchiefs and +underclothes before and after their trips to the laundry. He has seldom, +I think, had intimate trafficking with pillow-cases, sheets, +counterpanes and tablecloths. In the reckoning of these he is apt to +make mistakes and to lapse into a casualness which, in a woman familiar +with household routine, would be improbable. "Sister's" sharpest +reproofs were called forth by errors made in connection with this daily +exchange of clean for dirty linen. + +A form, of course, had to be filled in. (The army provides a form +for everything.) This form presents a catalogue of eighty-one +separate items, from "Blankets" ("Child's," "Infant's"--I do not +know what is the difference between them, and I never had to deal with +either--"G.S."--whatever that may be--and "White") to "Waist-coats, +Strait." It distinguishes between ten kinds of "Cases"--pillow-cases, +paillasse-cases, and the like: for example, there are "barrack" +bolster-cases and "hospital" bolster-cases; and you must not confound +"hospital" mattress-cases with "officers'" mattress-cases. You are +misled if you imagine that the heading "Cases" has exhausted the +possibilities which appeared to be latent in that noun; for, in addition +to the ten unqualified "Cases" there are seven more, defined as "Cases, +slip." Can you wonder that the orderly, presented with a bin-full of +confused and crumpled objects ready for the wash, and told to count them +and enter their numbers in the appointed columns, occasionally made a +wrong guess? Then there were eight sorts of "Cloths"--tablecloth, +tray-cloth, distinctive cloth, and so forth. (To how many lay minds does +"distinctive cloth" convey any meaning?) Counterpanes you would think to +be obvious enough; but that remarkable compilation, the _Check Book for +Hospital Linen_ ("Printed for H.M. Stationery Office...." etc.), +recognises four varieties. It also allows for four varieties of sheets, +four of aprons and four of trousers. Of towels it knows six. + +Each ward has a certain stock of linen in its cupboard. That stock can +only be kept at the proper level by strict barter of a soiled object for +a clean duplicate of the same object. As there are three hundred and +sixty-five days in the year on which this transaction occurs, and sixty +wards' bundles of linen to be dealt with by both the Dirty Linen +Department and the Clean Linen Department on each of those days, it is +clear that exactitude in the filling-in of the form aforementioned +becomes an affair of almost nightmare importance. Bring back from the +Clean Linen Store three dusters instead of the four dusters which you +previously handed in at the Dirty Linen Store, and your cupboard will, +to the end of time, be short of one duster which it should have +possessed. Even if Sister fails to pounce promptly on the evidence of +the loss, the quartermaster's dread stocktaking will ultimately find you +out. Your cupboard declines to correspond with his book-entries. And +there is trouble brewing, in consequence. (But indeed, if the loss of a +single duster were the sole crime revealed on stocktaking day, you would +be fortunate.) + +The orderly, with an obese bundle of washing on his back, plods from the +ward to the Dirty Linen Store at quarter to nine every morning. I say he +"plods" because the bundle is generally too heavy for transportation at +a rapid pace. Twenty sheets are usually but a part of the bundle; and +twenty sheets are alone no light burden. Between his teeth--both his +hands being occupied with the balancing of the bundle--he carries his +chit: that indispensable list. Arrived at the store he dumps the bundle +on the ground, opens it, and pitches its contents piecemeal over a +counter to one of the staff of the store. One by one the objects are +named and counted aloud, as they fly across the counter, the staff +orderly simultaneously checking the list and keeping an eye on what he +is receiving. For we may, by guile, palm off on him one sheet as two. It +can be done, by means of a certain legerdemain which comes with +practice. Or we may have received from the Dry Store, amongst the rags +meant for cleaning purposes, a couple of quite worn-out socks, not a +pair, and long past placing on human feet: these derelicts, with a rapid +motion, can be passed over the counter amongst the good socks, and only +later in the day will the Dirty Linen Store officials detect the +fraud--when it is impossible to locate its perpetrator. The +store-orderly's job is therefore one requiring some astuteness: his +checking of the list has to be achieved at a high speed and in the midst +of a babel; for as many ward-orderlies are present as the length of the +counter will accommodate, and they are all getting rid of their +dirty-linen bundles at the tops of their voices. + +Altercations, I am afraid, were not infrequent in the epoch when the +actors in this drama were of the male sex. (Even now, when the scene is +mainly feminine, I believe differences of opinion continue to arise, but +doubtless the language in which they are conducted is seemlier if no +less deadly.) The store-orderly had a marvellous eye for the difference +between two kinds of shirts which are worn by our patients. One kind has +a pleat in the back, the other kind hasn't; and I confess I occasionally +transposed them, on the form. It was fatal to do so. There was a +separate line for each brand of shirt and there must be a separate +entry. The store-orderly's trained powers of observation could see that +pleat, or the absence of it, even as the shirt slid across his line of +vision in a torrent of other shirts. His hand shot out and grabbed it +back from joining the heap on the floor within the counter. His pencil +poised itself from the ticking-off of the items on the form. "Wrong +again!" he would cry, sometimes in anguish and sometimes in anger. And +there was nothing for it but to apologise. To keep on good terms with +the various orderlies in the various stores was the secret of making +one's life worth living--a secret even profounder than that of keeping +on good terms with Sister: to be sure it was (though she seldom realised +it) the very foundation of the art of keeping on good terms with her. +You could not even begin to please Sister unless, at the end of those +incessant journeyings of yours which she did not see, you had dealings +with store-orderlies who were obliging and who would give you the things +which the taskmistress had sent you to fetch (or would drop a kindly +hint as to where and by what means you could acquire them). The Dirty +Linen Store orderly who declined to accept your plea for forgiveness +when you had been obtuse enough to see a fomentation-wringer in a +teacloth, could devastate the harmony of a whole forenoon. A sweet +reasonableness was undoubtedly the note to strike when such a +contretemps occurred. + +Having got quit of the last item in your bundle, you returned to the +ward to attend to other (and generally less entertaining) duties until +such time as it was proper to repair to the Clean Linen Store. The staff +of the Clean Linen Store, a huge department whose system of book-keeping +is enough to make the brain reel (for here sheets, etc., are dealt with +not in dozens but in thousands), had in the interim received your chit +from their colleagues of the Dirty Linen Store. These latter, rashly or +otherwise, had guaranteed its accuracy by initialing it. Accordingly, in +the Clean Linen Store, a fresh bundle was ready for your acceptance, its +contents consisting of duplicates of the objects now on their way to the +laundry. + +It was unwise, however, to accept this neatly folded and virginal bundle +without investigation. It might contain what the chit demanded; or it +might not. Before you could carry it off you must yourself initial, and +finally bid farewell to, the chit: thereby certifying that you had got +what you claimed. To make sure of this you would be well advised to undo +the bundle, and (as far as was practicable in a jostling crowd of +fellow-orderlies similarly employed) run through the whole of its +contents, computing them with precision: twenty sheets, twelve +pillow-cases, nine bolster-cases--it is only too easy to miss the +difference in the sizes of these--seventeen hand-towels, two +operating-aprons, eleven handkerchiefs, ten pyjama trousers, ten +sleeping-jackets, and so on. When you had ticked-off all these separate +items in the list you scribbled your initials thereon and fled with your +bundle--to find, as often as not, that Sister, sorting the things into +her cupboard, could discover a mistake after all. This meant a humble +return to the Clean Linen Store to beg for the mistake's rectification; +and the sergeant in charge had merely to take your chit from his file, +and show you your own initials on it, to prove that you were in the +wrong. + +It is conceivable that by means of a ward stocktaking and a reference of +the results to the figures in the sergeant's huge ledger, you might have +proved that you were not in the wrong. But the only time I ever knew one +of these disputes to be thus put to the test I admit I wished that I had +refrained from so temerarious an adventure. Somehow or other I had +managed to come back to the ward with three clean pillow-cases fewer +than the tale of dirty ones I had taken away. And Sister was exceedingly +cross. The particular Sister whose drudge I was at that period was +rather apt to be cross; and this was one of her crossest days. She +threatened to "report" me, and in fact did so. I was not--as she seemed +to expect--shot at dawn. I merely underwent a formal reproof from a high +authority who perhaps (but this is a surmise) knew Sister's +idiosyncrasies even better than I did. There remained, nevertheless, the +pressing problem of the three strayed pillow-cases. These Sister +commanded me to obtain from the Clean Linen Store. But you cannot go to +the Clean Linen Store and say "Please give me three pillow-cases." The +Clean Linen Store either says "Why?" (a question which, under the +circumstances, is flatly unanswerable), or else tells you, in language +both firm and ornamental, that you have already had them: your initialed +chit testifies the fact. + +At all events, after some parley, the Clean Linen Store sergeant (who +was less of an ogre than he pretended) offered to strike a bargain with +me. If I would count all the pillow-cases, in and out of use, in my +ward, and bring him the total, he would compare the said total with the +figures in his ledger. Those figures he would not divulge to me. But if +the number I announced was three short of the number in his ledger, he +would give me the three, and say no more about it. + +The bargain seemed a fair one. In Sister's absence I spent a precious +half-hour of what should have been my "afternoon off" in counting all +the pillow-cases I could find in the ward. A good-natured probationer, +who sympathised with me in my difficulties (she too had suffered), +counted them also. A convalescent patient interested himself in the +problem: he also went the round of the beds, and investigated the +cupboard, counting all the pillow-cases. We three each arrived at the +same total. Armed with this total I marched back to the sergeant in the +Clean Linen Store. + +He turned up his ledger and ran his finger down the page till he came +to the entry of pillow-cases opposite to my ward. And then he laughed a +laugh of fiendish glee. + +"Do you know," he said, "that instead of having three pillow-cases too +few, you've seven too many!" + +Such are the traps set by the business man, the expert of ledgers, for +the innocent amateur. We had actually got more pillow-cases than we were +entitled to. All unwittingly, in my eagerness to placate Sister, I had +published the mild chicanery in which she had indulged on behalf of her +ward. The sergeant, growing grey in the solution of these abstruse +mathematical and psychological mysteries, had suspected this Sister all +along. He enlightened me. She had recently been transferred from another +ward--and in her going had (against the rules) wafted with her a small +selection of that ward's property.... And now there would be a surprise +stocktaking in her new ward: the seven surplus pillow-cases--and perhaps +other loot--would have to be explained. Sister, in short, was in for a +_mauvais quart d'heure_. + +It was a suitable penalty for her crossness. It should have taught her +the perils of crossness. With regret I add that she did not envisage the +episode in that light. She was merely rather crosser than before. It was +without any profound sorrow that I soon afterwards bade her farewell, on +her departure to overseas spheres of activity. But she had at least +afforded me a lesson in the importance of accuracy over my dirty and +clean linen bundles. Never again would I risk the ordeal of a surprise +stocktaking; never again would I risk a combat with a ledger-fortified +sergeant; never again would I risk any attempt at the tortuous in my +dealings with the classifications of the eighty-one items on the +tear-off leaf of that dire volume, the _Check Book for Hospital Linen_. + + + + +IX + +ON BUTTONS + + +In one of his recent books Mr. H.G. Wells expresses a surprised +annoyance at the spectacle of spurs. Vast numbers of military gentlemen +(he observed at the front) go clanking about in spurs although they have +never had--and never will have--occasion to bestride a horse. Spurs are +a symbolic survival, a waste of steel and of labour in manufacture, a +futile expenditure of energy to keep clean and to put on and take off. + +When I first enlisted I felt a similar irritation in regard to buttons. +His buttons are a burden to the new recruit. Time takes the edge off his +resentment. Time is a soother of sorrows, a healer of rancours, however +legitimate. Nevertheless one's buttons remain for ever a nuisance. I do +not complain that I should have to make my bed, polish my boots, keep +my clothes neat. These are the obvious decencies of life. But the daily +shining-up of metal buttons which need never have been made of metal at +all, which tarnish in the damp and indeed lose their lustre in an hour +in any weather, which, moreover, look much prettier dull than +bright--this is enough to convert the most bloodthirsty recruit into +obdurate pacifism. + +It is to be presumed that in the pipe-claying days of peace the hours +were apt to hang heavy in barracks, and the furbishing of buttons was +devised not alone for smartness' sake, but to occupy idle hands for +which otherwise Satan might be finding some more mischievous employment. +The theory--though it throws a lurid light on the unprofitableness of a +soldier's profession when there is no war to justify his existence--is +not devoid of sense. But why this custom, designed for that excellent +mortal, the T. Atkins who walked out with nurse-maids, and was none too +busy between-whiles, should be forced upon a totally different (if no +less estimable) T. Atkins whose job hardly gives him a moment for +meals--let alone for dalliance with the fair--I cannot pretend to +fathom. It is arguable that the ornamental soldier is suited by glossy +buttons and may properly lavish time and trouble thereupon. It is not +arguable that glossy buttons are a valid feature of the garb of a +humdrum and harassed hospital orderly. + +Many a time, footsore and aching with novel toil, I could have groaned +when, instead of lying down to relax, I had to tackle the polishing of +that idiotic panoply of buttons. My tunic had (it still has) five large +buttons in front, four pocket-flap buttons, two shoulder buttons, and +two shoulder numerals, "T.--R.A.M.C.--LONDON." My great-coat had (it +still has) five large front buttons, two shoulder buttons and two +shoulder numerals, three back belt buttons, two coat-tail buttons. My +cap had (it still has) a badge and two small strap-buttons. All these +must be kept brilliant. And, in addition, there was the intricate +brasswork of one's belt. + +Are the wounded any better looked after because a tired orderly has +spent some of his off-duty rest-hour in rubbing metal buttons which +would have been every bit as buttonable had they been made of bone? + +Many were the debates, in our hut, over the button problem. The +abolition of metal buttons being impracticable--the bold project of a +petition to the King and Lord Kitchener was never proceeded with--two +questions alone interested us: (1) which was the best polish, and (2) +which was the quickest and easiest system of polishing. The shabby +peddler-cum-boot-maker who had somehow established, at that period, a +monopoly of the minor trade of our camp, vended a substance (in penny +tins) called Soldier's Friend. This was a solidified plate-polish of a +pink hue. Having--as per the instructions--"moistened" it, in other +words, spat upon it, you worked up a modicum of the resulting pink mud +with an old toothbrush, then applied same to each button. When you had +rubbed a pink film on to the button you proceeded to rub it off again, +and lo! the tarnish had departed like an evil dream and the metal +glistened as if fresh from the mint. If you were very particular you +finished the performance with chamois leather. Thereafter you lost the +last precious five minutes before parade in efforts, with knife-blade or +clothesbrush, to remove from your tunic the smears of pink paste which +had failed to repose on the buttons and had stuck to the surrounding +cloth instead. Luckily, Soldier's Friend dries and cakes and powders off +fairly quickly. It is a lovable substance, in its simple behaviour, its +lack of complications. I surmise that somebody has made a fortune out of +manufacturing millions of those penny tins. There is at least one +imitation of Soldier's Friend on the market, and, like most imitations, +it is neither better nor worse than the original. Except for the name on +the outside of the tin, the two commodities cannot be told apart. No +doubt the imitator has likewise made a fortune. If so, both fortunes +have been amassed from a foible to whose blatant uselessness and +wastefulness even a Bond Street jeweller or a de-luxe hotel chef would +be ashamed to give countenance. + +One member of the hut's company, more fastidious than his fellows, +objected to expectorating on to his Soldier's Friend. Rather than do so +he would tramp the fifty yards to our wash-place and obtain a couple of +drops of water from the tap. (The same man thought nothing of keeping a +half-consumed ham, some decaying fruit, and an opened pot of Bovril all +wrapped in his spare clothes in his box under his bed. That is by the +way. I am here concerned not with human nature, but with buttons.) Plain +water, however, was voted less effective than the more popular liquid. +The scientifically minded had a notion that human spittle contained some +acid which Nature had evolved specially to assist the action of +Soldier's Friend. I am bound to say that I was of the anti-plain-water +party myself. For a space I became an adherent of the experimentalists +who moistened their Soldier's Friend with methylated spirit, alleging +that the ensuing polish was more permanent. I lapsed. My small bottle of +methylated spirit came to an end, and on reflection I was not sure that +its superiority over spittle had been proved. Nothing, in the English +climate, can make the sheen of metal buttons endure, at the +outside, more than one day. "Bluebell," "Silvo," and the other +chemico-frictional preparations in favour of which I ultimately +abandoned Soldier's Friend, are alike in this--that their virtue lies in +frequent application, diligence and elbow-grease. They are, every one, +excellent. Their inventors deserve our gratitude. But our gratitude to +their inventors must be nothing compared with their inventors' gratitude +to the person who decreed that the hard-pressed T. Atkins of the Great +War should wear (at least in part) the same needless finery as the +relatively otiose T. Atkins of Peace. May that despot, whoever he be, +depart to a realm of bliss--I suppose it would be bliss to him--where he +has to do hospital orderlies' chores in an attire completely composed of +tarnishing buttons, every separate one of which must hourly be brought +up to the parade standard of specklessness. + + + + +X + +A WORD ABOUT "SLACKERS IN KHAKI" + + +When the ambulances containing a new batch of wounded begin to roll up +to the entrance of the hospital they are received by a squad of +orderlies. To a spectator who happened to pass at that moment it might +appear that these orderlies had nothing else to do but lift stretchers +out of ambulances and carry them indoors. The squad of orderlies have an +air of always being ready on duty waiting to pounce out on any patient +who may arrive at any hour of the day or night and promptly transfer him +to his bed. I have known of a visitor, witnessing this incident, who +commented on it in a manner which showed that he imagined he had seen +our unit performing its sole function; he pictured us existing purely +and simply for one end--the carrying of stretchers up the front steps +into the building. He was kind enough to praise the rapidity with which +the job was done--but he held it to be a job which hardly justified the +enlistment of so considerable a company of able-bodied males. What, +exactly, we did with ourselves during the long hours when ambulances +were _not_ arriving, he failed to understand. I suppose he pictured us +twiddling our thumbs in some kind of cosy club-room situated in the +neighbourhood of the front door, from whence we could be summoned as +soon as another convoy hove in sight. + +The truth of the matter is quite otherwise. Arrivals of wounded, even +when they occur several times a day (I have known six hundred patients +enter the hospital in forty-eight hours), are far from being our chief +preoccupation. Admittedly they take precedence of other duties. The +message, "Convoy coming! Every man wanted in the main hall!" is the +signal for each member of the unit who is not engaged in certain +exempted sections to drop his work, whatever it is, and proceed smartly +to report to the sergeant-in-charge. The telephone has notified us of +the hour at which the ambulances may be expected; the hospital's +internal telephone system has passed on the tidings to the various +officials concerned; and, five minutes before the patients are due, all +the orderlies likely to be required must "down tools," so to speak, and +line-up at the door. They come streaming from every corner of the +hospital and of its grounds. Some have been working in wards, some have +been pushing trollies in the corridors, some have been shovelling coke, +some have been toiling in the cookhouse or stores, some have been +shifting loads of bedding to the fumigator, some have been on "sanitary +fatigue," some have been cleaning windows or whitewashing walls, some +have been writing or typing documents, some have been spending their +rest-hour in slumber or over a game of billiards. Whatever they were +doing, they must stop doing it at the word of command. + +If the convoy be a large one, its advent may even mean, for the +orderlies, the dread announcement, "All passes stopped." The luckless +wight whose one afternoon-off in the week this happens to be, and who +has probably arranged to tryst with a lady friend, finds, at the gate, +that he is turned back by the sentry. In vain he displays his pass, +properly signed, stamped and dated: the telephone has warned the sentry +(or "R.M.P."--Regimental Military Policeman) that the passes have been +countermanded. Until the convoy has been dealt with, the pass is so much +waste paper, and the unfortunate orderly's inamorata will look for him +and behold him not. How many painful misunderstandings this "All passes +stopped" law has given rise to, one shudders to guess. + +But indeed no war-hospital orderly ever arranges any appointment without +the proviso that he is liable to break it. The folk who imagine that the +hospital orderly enjoys a "cushy job" (to use the appropriate +vernacular) seldom make sufficient allowance for this painful aspect of +it. The ordinary soldier in training in an English camp has his evenings +free, and certain other free times, which are nearly as sure as the +sun's rising. The hospital orderly is _never_--in theory at any +rate--off duty. His free moments are regarded not as a right but as a +favour: no freedom, at any time, can be guaranteed. He is liable to be +called on in the middle of the night, or at the instant when he is going +off duty, or when at a meal, or when resting, or when on the point of +walking out in pursuance of the gentle art of courtship. And he must +respond, instanter, or he will find that he has earned the C.B.--which +in this instance means not Companion of the Bath, but Confined to +Barracks, a punishment as hard to bear as the cruel "keeping in" of our +school-days. + +Without presuming to compare either the importance or the onerousness of +the hospital orderly's work with that of the soldier capable of going to +the front to fight, I would here add that the critic who watches the +stretcher-carrying and thinks it a pity that able-bodied males should be +wasted on it, is doing the system (not to mention the men themselves) an +injustice. For the men whom he sees are not, as a matter of fact, +able-bodied, even though muscular enough to stand this short physical +effort. Excitable old gentlemen who believe that they can decide at a +glance whether a man is medically fit, and write to the Press about the +"shirkers" they think they have detected, were of the opinion, long +since, that the R.A.M.C. should be combed out. Certain journals made a +great feature of this proposal. Whatever may be the case elsewhere, I +can only say that as far as our unit was concerned it had already, +months before the newspaper agitation, been combed out five times; and +this in spite of the fact that, at the period when I enlisted, our +Colonel declined to look at any recruit who was not either over age or +had been rejected for active service. The unit was thus made up, even +then, of elderly men and of "crocks." (This was before the start of the +Derby Scheme and, of course, considerably before the introduction of +Universal Service.) Perhaps it is allowable to point the moral against +the "shirker"-discovering armchair patriots aforesaid: that no small +proportion of our unit was composed of over-age recruits who, instead +of informing the world at large that they wished they were younger, +"And, by Gad, I envy the lads their chance to do _anything_ in the +country's cause," did not rest until they had found an opening. In my +own hut there were two recruits over sixty years of age. Elsewhere in +the unit there were several over fifty. Our mess-room at meal times was, +and still is, dotted with grey-haired heads, not of retired army men +rejoined, but of men who, previous to the war, had lived comfortable +civilian lives. At a later date, when the few fit men that our +combings-out revealed had gone elsewhere, the unit was kept up to +strength by the drafting-in either of C3 recruits or of soldiers who, +having been at the front and been wounded, or invalided back, were +marked for home duty only. So much for the "slackers in khaki" which one +extra emphatic writer (himself not in khaki, although younger than +several of the orderlies here) professed to discover in the R.A.M.C. +Those "slackers" may be having an easier time of it than the heroes of +France, Gallipoli, Salonika, Egypt and Mesopotamia. But they are not +having so easy a time as some of their detractors. + +The hospital orderly is not (I think I may assert on his behalf) puffed +up with foolish illusions as to his place in the scheme of things. It is +a humble place, and he knows it. His work is almost comically +unromantic, painfully unpicturesque. Moreover--let us be frank--much of +it is uninteresting, after the first novelty has worn off. Work in the +wards has its compensations: here there is the human element. But only a +portion of a unit such as ours can be detailed for ward work: the rest +are either hewers of wood and drawers of water or else have their noses +to a grindstone of clerical monotonousness beside which the +ledger-keeping of a bank employee is a heaven of blissful excitements. +You will find few hospital orderlies who are not "fed up"; you will find +none who do not long for the war's end. And I fancy you will find very, +very few who would not go on active service if they could. On the +occasions when we have had calls for overseas volunteers, the response +has always exceeded the demand. The people who, looking at a party of +hospital orderlies, remark--it sounds incredible, but there _are_ people +who make the remark--"These fellows should be out at the front," may +further be reminded that "these fellows" now have no say in the choice +of their own whereabouts. Not a soldier in the land can decide where or +how he shall serve. That small matter is not for him, but for the +authorities. He may be thirsting for the gore of Brother Boche, and an +inexorable fate condemns him to scrub the gore of Brother Briton off the +tiles of the operating theatre. He may (but I never met one who did) +elect to sit snugly on a stool at a desk filling-in army forms or +conducting a card index; and lo, at a whisper from some unseen Nabob in +the War Office, he finds himself hooked willy-nilly off his stool and +dumped into the Rifle Brigade. This is what it means to be in khaki, and +it is hardly the place of persons not in khaki to bandy sneers about the +comfortableness of the Linseed Lancers whose initials, when not standing +for Rob All My Comrades, can be interpreted to mean Run Away, Matron's +Coming. The squad of orderlies unloading that procession of ambulances +at the hospital door may not envy the wounded sufferers whom they +transmit to their wards; but the observer is mistaken if he assumes that +the orderlies have, by some questionable manoeuvre, dodged the fiery +ordeal of which this string of slow-moving stretchers is the harvest. + + + + +XI + +THE RECREATION ROOMS + + +We rather pride ourselves, at the 3rd London, on the fame of our +hospital not merely as a place in which the wounded get well, but as a +place in which they also "have a good time." The two things, truth to +tell, are interlinked--a truism which might seem to need no labouring, +were it not for the evidence brought from more rigid and red-tape-ridden +establishments. A couple of our most valued departments are the "Old +Rec." and the "New Rec."--the old and new recreation rooms. The new +recreation room, a spacious and well-built "hut," contains three +billiard tables, a library, and current newspapers, British and +Colonial. This room is the scene of whist-drives, billiard and pool +tournaments, and other sociable ongoings. Sometimes there is an +exhibition match on the best billiard table: the local champion of +Wandsworth shows us his skill--and a very pretty touch he has: once the +lady billiard champion of England came, and defeated the best opponent +we could enlist against her--an event which provoked tremendous applause +from a packed congregation of boys in blue. + +The old recreation room is fitted with a permanent stage for theatricals +and concerts. It is also our "Movie Palace." (I think our hospital was +the first to instal a cinematograph as a fixture.) During the morning +the floor area is dotted with miniature billiard tables--which are never +for a moment out of use. In the afternoon these are removed; some +hundreds of chairs replace them; and at 4.30 we begin an +entertainment--music, a play (we have had Shakespeare here), lantern +slides, films, or what not. Those entertainments, which have continued +unbrokenly since the hospital began to function in 1914, constitute the +outstanding feature of the "good time" enjoyed by 3rd Londoners. The +"Old Rec." and its crowded concerts will be a memory cherished by hosts +of fighting men from the homeland and from overseas. + +In the original hospital plan--drawn up before the war--the Old Rec. +(which is a part of the main school building) was marked down to be a +ward of forty beds. Its structure, its internal geography, and the sheer +impossibility of providing it with the essential sanitary conveniences, +would make it unsuitable to be a ward of four beds, let alone of forty. +On this account its allotment for recreation purposes would be +excusable. But the Old Rec. and the New Rec. too, for that matter, +justify their superficial waste of bed-space on other--and +unanswerable--grounds. It is a mere matter of common sense to arrange +some centre to which the patient can repair and employ his leisure when +he is sufficiently well to potter about though not well enough to be +discharged from hospital. Instead of idling in his ward and disturbing +the patients who are still confined to bed--and who, often, are urgently +in need of quietness--the convalescent departs to one or other of the +recreation rooms, morning and afternoon, where he can make as much +noise as he likes and where he can meet and fraternise with his comrades +from every front. (What exchanging of stories those recreation rooms +have witnessed!) On the one hand, then, the seriously ill patient is not +annoyed by the rovings in the ward of the walking patients; and on the +other the walking patients are not irked by the necessity for keeping +quiet at a period when returning health stimulates them to a wholesome +desire for fun. Both kinds of patients, thus, may legitimately be said +to get better more quickly than they would have had a chance to do were +it not for the recreation rooms. It is within the writer's knowledge +that the medical staff of the hospital, on being consulted as to the +"bed value" of the recreation rooms, unanimously agreed that their +existence reduced the average sojourn of the hospital's inmates by a +definite "per day" ratio: that ratio, so far from showing a bed-space +waste, worked out at a per-annum gain of bed-space equivalent to a +ward--if such a colossal ward could conceived!--of upwards of 300 beds. +So much for a point which might not appear to be worth detailed +explanation, but which has here been glanced at in order that critics +(for, unbelievable though it sounds, there have been curmudgeons to +growl of spoiling the wounded by too much pleasure) may be answered in +advance. The recreation rooms are a paying investment both to the +hospital and to the State. This is our trump card in any "spoiling the +wounded" controversy--though I dare say that most of us would not, in +any case, care twopence whether the concerts and films and billiards +were an investment or an extravagance: nothing would stand in the way of +our ambition to provide the now proverbial "good time" for all the +guests of the 3rd London. + +Scores of concerts of an excellence which would have been noteworthy +anywhere have been presented to our assemblages of wounded in the Old +Rec. Singers, musicians, actors and actresses have come and given of +their best. Miss Hullah's Music in War Time Committee (that delightful +body), and Mr. Howard Williams's parties, are perhaps our greatest +regular standbys. Certain sections of the public know Mr. Howard +Williams's name as a famous one in other fields of activity: to +thousands of soldiers it is honoured as that of the man who tirelessly +organised scrumptious tea-parties, pierrot shows, exhibition boxing +contests, nigger troupe entertainments--a list of jollifications, +indoors in winter and in the open air in summer, infinite in variety and +guaranteed never once to fall flat. A curious Empire reputation, this of +Mr. Williams! + +Yesterday, for instance, a nigger troupe visited the hospital. To be +exact, they were the Metropolitan Police Minstrels ("By Permission of +Sir E.R. Henry, G.C.V.O., K.C.B., C.S.I., Commissioner"); but no member +of the audience, I imagine, could picture those jocose blackamoors, with +their tambourines and bones, as really being anything so serious as +traffic-controlling constables. That their comic songs were accompanied +by a faultless orchestra was understandable enough. One can believe in a +police band. One is not surprised that the police band is a good band. +To believe that the ebony-visaged person with the huge red +indiarubber-flexible mouth who sings "Under the archway, Archibald," and +follows this amorous ditty with a clog dance is--in his washed +moments--the terror of burglars, requires unthinkable flights of +imagination. As I gazed at this singular resurrection of Moore and +Burgess and breathless childhood's afternoons at the St. James's +Hall--the half circle of inanely alert faces the colour of fresh +polished boots--the preposterous uniforms and expansive +shirt-fronts--the "nigger" dialect which this strange convention demands +but which cannot be said to resemble the speech of any African tribe yet +discovered--I found that by no effort of faith or credulity could I +pierce the disguise and perceive policemen. + +It is at least twenty years since I met a nigger minstrel in the flesh. +Vague ghosts of bygone persons and of piquant anachronisms seemed to +float approvingly in the air: the Prince Consort, bustles, the high +bicycle, sherry, Moody and Sankey, the Crystal Palace, Labouchere, "Pigs +in Clover," Lottie Collins, Evolution, Bimetallism: hosts of forgotten +images, names and shibboleths came popping out from the brain's dusty +pigeon-holes, magically released by the spectacle of the nigger troupe. + +Yes, I was indeed switched into the past by Mr. Bones, Massa Jawns'n and +the rest. And yet the present might have seemed more emphatic and more +poignant. One felt, rather than saw, an audience of several hundred +persons in the dim rows of chairs. And laughing at the broad witticisms +of the niggers, or enjoying their choruses and orchestral +accompaniments, one forgot just what that half-glimpsed audience +consisted of; what it meant, and how it came to be here assembled. + +Of course when the lights were turned up in the interval, one beheld the +usual spectacle: stretchers, wheeled chairs, crutches, bandaged heads, +arms in splints, blind men, men with one arm, men with one leg: rank on +rank of war's flotsam and jetsam, British, Australians, New Zealanders, +Newfoundlanders, Canadians, come to make merry over the minstrels: in +the front row the Colonel and the Matron, with officer patients; here +and there an orderly or a V.A.D.; here and there a Sister with her +"boys." It was a family gathering. I descried no strangers, and no one +not in uniform--unless you count the men too ill to don their blue +slops: these had been brought in dressing-gowns or wrapped in blankets. +No mere haphazard audience, this, of anybody and everybody who chooses +to pay at a turnstile! Entrance to this hall is free ... but the price +is beyond money, all the same. + +A family party it was, decidedly. Thick fumes of tobacco smoke uprose +from it. (Shall we ever abandon the cigarette habit, now?) Orderlies +continued to arrive and stow themselves discreetly in corners: by some +strange providence each orderly had found that for a while he could be +spared from ward or office. Staff-Sergeants, Sergeants, +Corporals--mysteriously they made time to leave their various +departments. Even a bevy of masseuses (those experts eternally on the +rush from ward to ward) had peeped in to see the nigger minstrels. And +everybody was pleased: every jest and every conundrum got its laugh, +every ballad its applause. Not that we ever "give the bird" to those +who come to amuse us. Offer us skill in any shape or form--pierrots, +niggers, pianist, violinist, conjurer, ventriloquist, dancer, reciter: +any or all of these will be appreciated warmly. + +Yesterday, for the nigger minstrels, there were no empty chairs. Until, +in the midst of Part II ("A Laughable Sketch"--_vide_ the +programme--wherein female roles were doubly coy by reason of the +masculinity of their falsetto dialogue and remarkable ankles) a +messenger stole hither and thither, whispering to the orderlies, who +promptly tiptoed from the room. + +A convoy of new arrivals demanded our presence. + +The silent ambulances were gliding up to the entrance of the hospital. +Orderlies, fetched from their jobs and from the entertainment, lined up +in the rain to take their places in the quartettes of bearers who lifted +out the stretchers. The Assistant Matron, standing in the shelter of the +door, checked her list; the Medical Officer handed out the ward tickets; +the lady clerks from the Admission and Discharge Office took the +patients' particulars. And the bathroom became very busy. + +As I started to wheel a much-bandaged warrior to his ward, the +recreation-room door opened and a burst of music-cum-essence-of-nigger +emerged on his astonished ears. I was a little doubtful as to whether +our new guest would not think his reception somewhat flippant in key. +The poor fellow was visibly suffering, and the sound of tambourines and +comedians' guffaws seemed a scarcely proper comment on his condition. I +might have spared myself these misgivings. "Say, chum," he interrogated +me feebly, "what's that noise?" "Nigger minstrels, old man." +"Golly!--and have I got to go straight to my bed?" + +Alas, he had to. It would be long before he could be well enough to be +taken to one of our entertainments. But, had he been given his way, he +would have gone direct from his fatiguing overseas journey into the Old +Rec. to join the family party and chuckle at Mr. Bones and Massa +Jawns'n.... No doubts assailed _his_ mind as to whether it was right to +"waste bed-space" on mere frivolities. A nigger minstrel show was to him +a deal more important, in fact, than his wound. And perhaps, in +instinct, he was not far wrong. + + + + +XII + +THE COCKNEY + + +Before I enlisted I was lodging in a house which it was occasionally +convenient to approach by a short cut through an area of slumland. One +night when traversing this slum--the hour was 1.30 a.m.--I was stopped +by a couple of women who told me that there was a man lying on the +ground in an adjacent alley; they thought he must be ill; would I come +and look at him? + +They led me down a turning which opened into a narrow court. This court +was reached by an arched tunnel through tenement houses. The tunnel was +pitchy black, but I struck matches as I proceeded, and presently we came +upon the object of my companions' solicitude--a young soldier, propped +against the wall and with his legs projecting across the flagstones. +The women had, in fact, discovered him by tripping over those legs in +the darkness. + +They were slatternly women, but warm-hearted; and when I had managed to +arouse the gentleman in khaki and hoist him to his feet (for the cause +of his indisposition was plain--and he had slept it off) they called +down blessings on my head and overwhelmed our friend with sympathy which +he did not wholly deserve and to which he made no rejoinder. Nor did he +vouchsafe any very lucid answer when I asked him whither he was bound. I +was prepared to pilot him--but I could hardly do so without knowing +towards which point of the compass he proposed to steer, or rather, to +be steered. "I know w'ere I wanter go," was all I could get out of him. +Very well; if he knew his address, it was no concern of mine; he could +lead on; I would act as a mere supporter. In this capacity, with my arm +linked firmly in his, I brought him forth from the tunnel to the street +(he had no wish, it seemed, to go through the tunnel into the court), +and here we bade farewell to the ladies. + +"Which way now?" I inquired. My charge responded not, but crossed to a +corner and meandered up one of those interminable thoroughfares which +lead out of London into the suburbs. Trudging with him and helping him +to sustain his balance, which was not as stable as could be wished, I +plied him with mildly genial conversation and at last elicited a few +vague answers. These were couched in the cockney idiom, but I caught a +faint nasal twang which led me to suspect that the speaker had come from +the other side of the Atlantic. Yes--he told me he had just arrived from +Canada. + +We had proceeded a short distance when on the further side of the street +I descried a golden halo which outlined the silhouette of a coffee +stall. It occurred to me that a cup of hot coffee would be a good tonic +to disperse the last symptoms of my friend's indiscretion, so I +deflected him across the road, and we brought up, together, alongside +the coffee-stall's counter. + +Lest the reader should be unacquainted with that unique creation, the +coffee-stall, I must explain that it is nocturnal in habit, emerging +from its lair only between the hours of 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. It is an +equipage of which the interior is inhabited by a fat, jolly man (at +least according to my experience he is always fat and jolly) surrounded +by steaming urns, plates of cake, buns of a citron-yellow hue, pale +pastries, ham sandwiches and packets of cigarettes. The upper panels of +one of its sides unfold to form a bar below and a penthouse roof above, +the latter being generally extended into an awning. The awning is a +protection for the customer not against the sun--a luminary from whose +assaults the London coffee-stalls have little to fear--but against the +rain. Thanks to these awnings, and the chattiness of the fat, jolly man, +and the warmth exhaled by the urns, and the circumstance that the public +houses are shut, our coffee-stalls are able to sell two brownish +beverages, called respectively coffee and tea, which otherwise could +hardly hope to achieve the honour of human consumption. + +Fate has guided me on many midnight pilgrimages through the town, and I +have imbibed, sometimes with relish, the liquids alluded to; I have also +partaken of the pallid pastry and the citron-yellow buns. I am therefore +in a position to write, for the benefit of persons less well informed, a +treatise on coffee-stalls. This I shall refrain from doing. The one +point it is necessary for me to mention is that the fat, jolly man, +being deplorably distrustful, does not supply casual customers with +teaspoons. You may have a cup of alleged tea (one penny) or a cup of +alleged coffee (one penny); a dollop of sugar is dropped into the cup; +the fat, jolly man gives the mixture a stir-round with a teaspoon; then +he places the cup before you on the bar; but the teaspoon is still in +his grasp. I dare say he would lend you the teaspoon if you requested +him to do so; but unless you have that audacity he prefers to keep the +teaspoon on his side of the bar, out of harm's way. This may seem +strange, when you perceive that the teaspoon is fashioned of a metal +unknown to silversmiths and might be priced at threepence. But even a +threepenny teaspoon is a souvenir which some collectors would not +despise. + +Presumably regular customers receive teaspoons, for teaspoons lie in a +heap on the fat, jolly man's side of the counter. This was the case at +the coffee-stall before which the young soldier and I ranged ourselves. +And the heap of teaspoons seemed to exercise a curious fascination upon +the soldier. He continued to stare at them for some minutes after I had +set in front of him his cup of coffee. Then he stared at the fat, jolly +man, who was cutting slabs from a loaf. He stared for a long time, +making no reply to my remarks. + +Rain began to patter on the awning--it had rained earlier in the +night--and I became aware of a figure, lurking in the background on the +pavement, beyond the awning's shelter, but within the radius of the haze +of light projected therefrom. It was a wretched, slinking figure, that +of an elderly man with bleared eyes and a red nose: one of those pariahs +who haunt cabstands and promote the cabs up the rank when the front +vehicle is hailed. This special specimen of his breed appeared to be a +satellite of the coffee-stall proprietor: perhaps he helped to tow the +stall to its berth. Whatever might be his function, he lingered on the +outskirts of the ring of light, watching us; and the young soldier, in +his slow scrutiny of the stall and its surroundings, caught sight of +him, and stared stolidly, as he had stared at everything else. + +I was in the act of drinking my coffee when the soldier suddenly leant +across the counter, picked up a spoon, turned, and threw it at the +derelict whose face wavered on the edge of the lamplight's circle. The +victim of this extraordinary attack dodged the missile, then grovelled +after it in the gutter. Meanwhile the fat man (instantaneously ceasing +to be jolly) gave vent to an angry protest. + +"Wotcher do _that_ for? Chuckin' my spoons abart! Drunk, that's wot you +are!" + +"Ain't drunk!" said the soldier. + +"Wotcher chuck my spoon at 'im for, then? 'E ain't done you no 'arm." + +"Yus 'e _'as_," was the soldier's surprising retort. + +"No 'e ain't." + +"Yus 'e _'as_." + +"No 'e 'ain't. 'E ain't done you no 'arm." + +To which the derelict chimed in (he had retrieved the spoon and now +advanced timidly with it under the awning): "I ain't done _you_ no +'arm"--a husky, whimpering chorus to his fat patron. + +The soldier fixed the derelict with a fierce glare. "Yus you _'ave_," he +reiterated. + +I was wondering how the dispute might develop, but evidently my ear is +unattuned to the nuances of these dialectics. The soldier's glare and +the soldier's tone must have betrayed themselves to the two other men as +factitious; the derelict, anyhow, lost his nervousness and, approaching +nearer, scanned the soldier with dim, peering eyes; then broke into a +joyous grin and exclaimed: + +"Lumme, if it ain't ol' Bert!" + +And the fat man, leaning on his counter, and likewise examining the +soldier, cried, "Ol' Bert it is!" + +"Knew you in two ticks," grunted Bert. "Same ol' 'Arry." (This was the +derelict.) "Same ol' 'Erb." (This was the fat--and once again +jolly--man.) + +Explanations ensued. Bert, the young soldier, was a native of these +parts. He had emigrated to Canada five years previously. To-night, _en +route_ for the front, he had returned. Earlier in the evening there had +been ill-advised libations; he had started for his home, felt sleepy, +sheltered from the wet in a tunnel quite familiar to him, and there been +discovered by the ladies and roused by myself. Arrived at the +coffee-stall he had recognised in its proprietor a former pal and +another former pal in 'Arry the derelict. To throw the spoon at 'Arry +was merely his playful mode of announcing his identity. + +I left the trio reviewing the past and exchanging news of the present. +My services, it was clear, would no longer be required by the prodigal. +He and his mates gave me a hearty good-night. + +I did not guess how intimate was soon to be my association with the +Berts and 'Arries and 'Erbs of the world. I was to be their servant, to +wait upon them, to perform menial tasks for them, to wash them and dress +them and undress them, to carry them in my arms. I was to see them +suffer and to learn to respect their gameness, and the wry, "grousing" +humour which is their almost universal trait. In my own wards, and +elsewhere in the hospital, I came in close contact with many cockneys of +the slums. Even when one had not precisely "placed" a patient of this +description, the relatives who came to him on visiting days gave the +clue to the stock from which he sprang. The mother was sometimes a +"flower girl"; the sweetheart, with a very feathered hat, and hair which +evidently lived in curling pins except on great occasions, probably +worked in a factory. These people, if the patient were confined to bed, +sat beside him and talked in a subdued, throaty whisper. But I have seen +the same sort of patient, well enough to walk about, meet his folks on +visiting afternoons at the hospital gate. There is a crowd at the +hospital gate, passing in and going out; hosts of patients are waiting, +some in wheeled chairs and some seated on the iron fence which fringes +the drive. The reunions which occur at that gate are exceedingly public. +Our East Ender is perhaps accustomed to publicity; his slum does not +conceal its feelings--it quarrels, and makes love, without drawn blinds, +and privacy is not an essential of its ardours. Be that as it may, these +meetings at the hospital gate, which are not lacking in pathos, have +sometimes manifested a tear-compelling comicality when the actors in the +drama belonged to the class which produced Bert. + +In a higher class there is restraint and a rather stupid bashfulness. I +have seen a wounded youngster flush apprehensively and only peck his +mother in return for her sobbing embrace. That is not Bert's way. He +knows--he is not a fool--that his mother looks a trifle absurd as, with +bonnet awry, she surges perspiringly past the sentries, the tails of her +skirt dragging in the dust and her feet flattened with the weight of +over-clad, unwholesome obesity they have to bear. But he hobbles sprily +to meet her, and his salute is no mere peck, but a smacking kiss, so +noisy that it makes everyone laugh. He laughs too--perhaps he did it on +purpose to raise a laugh: that is his quaint method; but the fact +remains that, whatever his motive, he has managed to please his mother. +She is sniffing loudly yet laughing also, and one could want no better +picture of human affection than this of Bermondsey Bert and his +shapeless, work-distorted, maybe bibulous-looking mother, exchanging +that resounding and ungraceful kiss at the hospital gate. I have heard +Bert shout "Mother!" from a hundred yards off, when he spied her coming +through the gate. No false shame there! No smug "good form" in that--nor +in the time-honoured jest which follows: "And 'ave you remembered to +bring me a bottle of beer, mother?" (Of course visitors are not allowed +to introduce alcohol into the hospital--otherwise I am afraid there is +no doubt that mother would have obliged.) + +In one of our wards we harboured, for a while, a costermonger. This +coster, an entertaining and plucky creature who had to have a leg +amputated, received no callers on visiting day: his own relatives were +dead and he and his wife had separated. "Couldn't 'it it orf," he +explained, and with laudable impartiality added, "Married beneath 'er, +she did, w'en she married me." As the lady was herself a coster, it was +plain that here, as in other grades of society, there are degrees, +conventions and barriers which may not be lightly overstepped. "Sister," +however, thought that the patient should inform his wife that he had +lost his leg, and prevailed on him to send her a letter to that effect. +A few days later he was asked, + +"Well, did you write and tell your wife you had lost a leg?" + +"Yus." + +"I suppose she's answered? What has she said?" + +"Said 'm a liar!" + +Her retort had neither disconcerted nor offended him. He was a +philosopher--and, like so many of his kind, a laughing philosopher. When +he was sufficiently recovered from his operation to get about on +crutches he was the wag of the ward. He took a special delight in those +practical jokes which are invented by patients to tease the nurses, and +devoted the most painstaking ingenuity to their preparation. It was he +who found a small hole in the lath-and-plaster wall which separates the +ward from the ward's kitchen. Through this hole a length of cotton was +passed and tied to the handle of a mug on the kitchen shelf. At this +period, owing to the Zeppelin raids, only the barest minimum of light +was allowed, and the night nurse, when she entered the kitchen, went +into almost complete darkness. No sooner was she in the kitchen and +fumbling for what she required than a faint noise--that of the cup being +twitched by the cotton leading to the mischievous coster's bed--arose on +the shelf and convinced her that she was in the presence of a mouse. She +retreated, and perhaps if any convalescent patient had been awake she +would have enlisted his aid to expel the mouse; but in the ward the +patients were, as one man, snoring vociferously. It was this slightly +overdone snoring, at the finish, which gave birth to suspicions and +caused the trick to be detected. + +The night nurses do not have a placid time of it if their patients +are at the stage of recovery when spirits begin to rise and +the early slumber-hour which the hospital rules prescribe is not +welcome. String-actuated knaveries, more or less similar to the +mouse-in-the-kitchen one, are always devised for the plaguing of a new +night nurse. Sometimes in the dead of night, when utter silence broods +over the ward, the gramophone will abruptly burst into raucous music: +its mechanism has been released by a contrivance which gives no clue to +the crime's perpetrator. The flustered nurse gropes her way down the +ward and stops the gramophone, every patient meanwhile sitting up in bed +and protesting against her cruelty in having awakened them by starting +it. Half an hour after the ward has quietened, the other gramophone +(some wards own two) whirrs off into impudent song: it also has been +primed. Nurse is wiser on future occasions: she stows the gramophones, +when she comes on duty, where no one can tamper with them. Even so, she +may have her nerves preyed upon by eerie tinklings, impossible to locate +in the darkness; these are caused by two knives, hung from a nail fixed +high up in the rafters. By jiggling a string, which is conducted over +another rafter and down the wall to his pillow, the patient makes the +knifeblades clash. Sometimes two strings, leading to different beds, +complete this instrument of torture. After a determined search, nurse +finds one string, and, having cut it, flatters herself that she has got +the better of her enemies. Not a bit of it. She has scarcely settled in +her chair again before the tinklings recommence. The second string is in +action; and as she hunts about the ward for the source of the melody in +the ceiling, muffled convulsions of mirth, from the dim rows of beds, +furnish evidence that her naughty charges are not getting the repose +which they require and to ensure which is part of the purpose of her +presence. + +A nurse who happens to be unpopular never has these pranks played upon +her. They are in the nature of a compliment. Nor do they occur in a +ward where there is a patient seriously ill. It is impossible to imagine +war-hospital patients acting inconsiderately towards a distressed +comrade. This observation renders all the more amusing the scandalised +concern which I once beheld on the demure physiognomy of a visiting +clergyman when he gathered the drift of certain allusions to a case on +the Danger List. + +The name of the Danger List explains itself. When a patient is put on +the Danger List, his relatives are sent for and may be with him whether +it is the visiting afternoon or not. (If they come from the provinces +they are presented with a railway pass and, if poor, are allotted +lodgings near the hospital, a grant being made to them from our +Benevolent Fund.) For the information of the V.A.D.'s who answer +visitors' questions in the Enquiry Bureau at the main entrance to the +hospital, a copy of the Danger List hangs there, and it is on record +that an awestruck child, seeing this column of patients' names, and +reading the heading, asked, "What does 'Danger List' mean? Does it mean +that it's dangerous to go near them?" Now in Ward C 22 a patient, a +cockney, was on the Danger List--which circumstance availed nothing to +depress his spirits. In spite of considerable pain, he poked fun at the +prospect of his own imminent demise, and was himself the chief offender +against the edict of quietness which "Sister" had issued for her ward. +He _would_ talk; and he _would_ talk about undertakers, post-mortems, +epitaphs and the details of a military funeral. "That there top note of +the Last Post on the bugle doesn't 'arf sound proper," he said--a +verdict which anyone who has heard this beautiful and inspired fanfare, +which is the farewell above a soldier's grave, and which ends on a +soaring treble, will endorse. "But," he went on, "if the bugler's 'ad a +drop o' somethin' warm on the way to the cemetery, that there top note +always reminds me of a 'iccup. An' if 'e 'iccups over me, I shall wanter +spit in 'is eye, blimey if I won't." + +This persiflage had been going on for a couple of days and getting to be +more and more elaborate and allusive, infecting the entire ward, so +that the fact that the man was on the Danger List had become a kind of +catchword amongst his fellows. Entered, in all innocence, the clergyman. +("The very bloke to put me up to all the tricks!"--from the irreverent +one.) At the same moment a walking patient, also a cockney, who had been +reading a newspaper, gave vent to a cry of feigned horror. "Boys!" he +announced, "it says 'ere there's a shortage of timber!" + +Guffaws greeted this sally. Everyone saw the innuendo at once--everyone +except the clergyman, and when he grasped the point, that Ol' Chum +So-and-So was on the Danger List and a shortage of timber was supposed +to imply that he might be done out of a coffin, he was visibly shocked. +Perhaps he did not understand cockney humour.... However, one may add +that our irrepressible friend, at the moment of writing, is off the +Danger List (albeit only after a protracted struggle with the Enemy at +whom he jeered), and is now contriving to be as funny about life as he +was funny--and fearless--about Death. + +I caught sight to-day of another cockney acquaintance of mine, whose +Christian name is Bill, trundling himself down the hospital drive in a +wheeled chair. Perched on the knee of his one leg, with its feet planted +on the stump which is all that is left of the other, was his child, aged +four. Beside him walked his wife, resplendent in a magenta blouse and a +hat with green and pink plumes. + +The trio looked happy, and Mrs. Bill's gala attire was symbolical. When +Bill was in my ward he too was on the Danger List. I remember that when +he first came to us, before his operation, and before he took a turn for +the worse, his wife visited him in that same magenta blouse (or another +equally startling) and that for some reason she and "Sister" did not +quite hit it off, "had words," and subsequently for a period were not on +speaking terms. Later, when Bill underwent his operation, and began to +sink, his bed was moved out on to the ward's verandah. Here his wife +(now wearing a subdued blouse) sat beside him, hour after hour, while +little Bill, the child, towed a cheap wooden engine up and down the +grass patch, oblivious to the ordeal through which his parents were +passing. It was my business, as orderly, to intrude at intervals upon +the scene on the verandah, to bring Bill such food as he was able to +tolerate. On the first occasion, after Bill's collapse, that I prepared +to take him a cup of tea, Sister stopped me. "Don't forget to take tea, +and some bread and butter, to that poor woman. She looks tired. And some +milk for the child." "Very good, Sister." I cut bread-and-butter, and +filled an extra mug of tea. "Orderly! What are you doing?" Sister had +reappeared. And I was rebuked because I was going to offer Mrs. Bill her +tea in a tin mug (the patients all have tin mugs) and had cut her +bread-and-butter too thick. I must cut dainty slices of thin +bread-and-butter, use Sister's own china ware, and serve the whole +spread on a tray with a cloth. All of which was typical of Sister, who +from that day treated Bill's wife with true tenderness; and Bill's wife +became one of Sister's most enthusiastic adorers. + +It came to pass, after a week of pitiful anxiety, that the Medical +Officer pronounced Bill safe once more. "Bloke says I'm not goin' ter +peg art," he told me. I congratulated him and remarked that his wife +would be thankful when he met her, on her arrival, with such splendid +news. "I'll 'ave the larf of my missus," said Bill. "W'en she comes, I +shall tell 'er I've some serious noos for 'er, and she's ter send the +kid darn on the grarse ter play. Then I'll pull a long fice and hask 'er +ter bear up, and say I'm sorry for 'er, and she mustn't tike it too +rough, and all that; and she 'as my sympathy in 'er diserpointment: _she +ain't ter get 'er widow's pension arter all_!" + +I believe that this programme was carried through, more or less to the +letter. Certain it is that I myself overheard another of Bill's grim +pleasantries. He was explaining to madame that they must apprentice +their offspring to the engineering trade. "I wanter mike Lil' Bill a +mowter chap, so's 'e can oil the ball-bearings of me fancy leg wot I'm +ter get at Roehampton." The "fancy leg" ended by being the favourite +theme of Bill's disgraceful extravaganzas. He would announce to Sister, +when she was dressing his stump, that he had been studying means of +earning his living in the future, and had decided to become a professor +of roller skating. He would loudly tell his wife that she would never +again be able to summons him for assault by kicking: the fancy leg would +not give the real one sufficient purchase for an effective kick. And she +was not to complain, in future, about his cold feet against her back in +bed: there would be only one cold foot, the other would be unhitched and +on the floor. And of course there were endless jokes about what had been +done with the amputated leg, whether it had got a tombstone, and so +forth: some of the suggestions going a trifle beyond what good taste, in +more fastidious coteries, would have thought permissible. But Bill had +his own ideas of the humorous, and maybe his own no less definite ideas +of dignity. In this latter virtue I counted the fact that although once +or twice, when he was very low, he gave way to a little fretting to me, +he never, I am convinced, let fall one querulous word in the presence of +his wife. She sat by her husband's side, and when things were at their +worst the two said naught. The wife numbly watched her Bill's face, +turning now and then to glance at the activities of little Bill with his +engine, or to smile her thanks to the patients who sometimes came and +gave the child pickaback rides. When I intruded, I knew I was +interrupting the communings of a loving and happily married pair; and +the "slangings" of each other which signalised Bill's recovery and his +wife's relief, did nothing to shake my certitude that, like many slum +dwellers, they owned a mutual esteem which other couples, of superior +station, might envy. + +Personally I have never known a cockney patient who did not evoke +affection; and as a matter of curiosity I have been asking a number of +Sisters whether they liked to have cockneys in their wards. Without a +single exception (and let me say that Sisters are both observant and +critical) the answers have been enthusiastically in the affirmative. + + + + +XIII + +THE STATION PARTY + + +An earnest shopman not long ago tried to sell me a pair of +marching-boots, "for use"--as he explained, lest their name should have +misled me--"on the march." Had he said "for use after the war" he might +have been more persuasive. When I told him that marching-boots were no +good to me, it was manifestly difficult for him to conceal his opinion +that, if so, I had no business to flaunt the garb of Thomas Atkins. When +I added that if he could offer me a pair of running-shoes I might +entertain the proposition, his look was a reproach to irreverent +facetiousness. + +A grateful country has presented me with one pair of excellent +marching-boots. But a hospital ward is no place in which to go clumping +about in footgear designed to stand hard wear and tear on the +high-roads; and my army boots, after two years, have not yet needed +re-soling. I wore them, it is true, during my period of service with the +Chain Gang, as a squad of outdoor orderlies, engaged in road-making, was +locally called. And I wear them when we have a "C.O.'s Parade"--an +occasion on which naught but officially-provided attire is allowable. It +would take a century of C.O.'s parades, however, to damage boots put on +five minutes before the event and taken off five minutes after: the +parade itself necessitating no sturdier pedestrianism than is involved +in walking less than a hundred yards to the ground and there standing +stock-still at attention. + +I do not say that hospital orderlies never go for a march: only that +marching bulks relatively so small in our programme that any special +equipment for the purpose sounds a little ironical. The issue of +ward-shoes, now, was a real boon. Not that all the pairs with which our +unit was suddenly flooded by the authorities proved as silent as they +were intended to be. Some of them squeaked; and the peregrinations of +the orderly thus afflicted were perhaps more vexatious to the ear of a +nervous patient at night than even the clatter of honest hobnails. And +the soles were thin. A pair of ward-shoes lasted me on the average one +month. If only worn within the ward they might have lasted +longer--though not so very much longer. According to regulations, you +were not allowed to wear ward-shoes except within the confines of the +ward. No doubt it was expected that every time you were sent on an +errand outside the ward you would solemnly take off your ward-shoes and +put on your marching-boots--then, on the return, take off your +marching-boots and put on your ward-shoes--but life as a nursing orderly +is too short for such elaborations of etiquette. It was nothing unusual, +when one was working in a ward which lay at a distance of quarter of a +mile from the hospital's main building, to be sent to the said main +building a dozen times in a single morning. This incessant +message-bearing had to be done, if not at the double, at any rate at +nothing slower than five miles per hour in the morning (the busy time); +in the afternoon a speed of four miles per hour might sometimes be +permissible. At all events, running-shoes, as I told the shopman, would +not have been inappropriate during certain periods of crisis. + +From time to time our tasks were interrupted by the notes of a bugle--or +the shrilling of the Sergeant-Major's whistle--demanding our presence +for an intake of new patients. A party of orderlies was wanted to go to +the railway-station to help to remove stretcher-cases from the ambulance +train. The station lies at a distance of a mile from the hospital, and +this small pilgrimage, achieved a few score times, is practically all I +know of the veritable employment of marching-boots. + +I regretted when a change of plans diverted the ambulance trains to the +central termini for evacuation. The interlude of a station-party trip +was far from unwelcome. Lined up on the parade ground we were put in +charge of a corporal. "Party, 'shun! Right turn! Quick march!" Off we +trudged, round the back of the hospital, down the drive, out past the +sentry and away along the road. Presently, "Party, march at ease!" +Cigarettes were lit, talking was allowed, and someone would raise a +tune. How pleasant it is to march to singing! To march to a +drum-and-fife band must be wonderful. Or a brass band--! Those joys will +never be mine. Almost all the marching I shall have done in the great +war will be summed up in these tiny promenades from the hospital to the +railway-station, their rhythm sustained by self-raised choruses, none +too melodious. + +Occasionally an officer would be descried, on the pavement. Then "Party, +'shun!" Cigarettes were concealed. The song died. "Eyes left! ... Eyes +front! Party, march at ease!" The cigarettes reappeared, the song was +resumed. Approaching the station, "Party, 'shun!" Cigarettes were thrown +away. Here, in the chief street, we must make a smart show. A crowd is +gathered round the station gate, attracted by the array of Red Cross +vehicles within. Police are keeping back the curious. The way is +cleared for our arrival. "Left wheel!" Now is our one moment of glory. +We swing round, through the lane of gaping sightseers, and tramp-tramp +in style across the station yard and under the archway, flattering +ourselves (perhaps not without justification) that there are spectators +whose eyes pursue us with secret envy at the serious import of our task. + +The station platform, when we reached it, was generally a blank +perspective devoid of all living creatures except ourselves. Fate +decreed that we should be summoned long before the train was due. I have +kicked my heels for many a doleful hour on that platform, and the +reflection that "they also serve who only stand and wait" was chilly +comfort if--as frequently happened--we had been hurried off dinnerless. +The convoys' arrivals always seemed to coincide with dinner-time. On our +return to the hospital we should find that the rations had been kept hot +for us. But, in the meanwhile, an empty stomach was a poor preparation +for the strain of carrying stretchers up the stairs from the station +platform to the ambulances; and those of us who could produce pennies +for automatic-machine chocolate gained an instant popularity. The +longest period of waiting drew to an end at last, however. The platform +assumed a livelier air. The station-master appeared from his den. +Officers of the Army Medical Service and the Red Cross strolled down. +And the stairs and platform echoed to the pattering of the feet of hosts +of industrious "Bluebottles," fetching stretchers and blankets. + +The blue-uniformed volunteers who form a portion of the London Ambulance +Column are nicknamed the Bluebottles in allusion to their dress. It is a +nickname which, let me say at once, any man might be proud of. I know +not whether the history of the Bluebottles has yet been written, but +certain it is that their doings have got into newspaper print less often +than they deserved. For theirs is a double role which truly merits the +country's admiration. While carrying on the commerce of the Empire--that +vital commerce without which there would be bankruptcy and no sinews of +war, nor indeed any England left to defend--they have vowed themselves +also, of their own free-will, to the helping of the wounded. Day or +night the Bluebottle is liable to be called from his desk or his home by +the telephone: like the Florentine Brother of the Misericordia he must +instantly hurry into his uniform and rush to the place appointed. He may +be busy or he may be tired; no matter: his vow holds good. Off he goes, +to the railway-station to meet the hospital train and evacuate its +stretchers. + +Myself, I have the deepest respect for the Bluebottles and for their +energy in a cause which must often be not only fatiguing, but, from a +commercial point of view, extremely inconvenient. It would be absurd to +pretend, nevertheless, that the less responsible khaki-wearing R.A.M.C. +do not cherish a mild contempt for all Bluebottles. There is no reason +for that contempt. It is idiotic, childish--a humiliating exhibition of +the silliness of masculine human nature. Members of our station-party +who had enlisted but a week back, and who knew nothing whatever of +their work, would, in a whisper, mock the Bluebottles--although every +Bluebottle had taken first-aid classes and passed examinations at which +most of the mockers would have boggled. The Bluebottles were "civilians" +... there you have it. We--who would probably never do any battlefield +soldiering in our lives--looked down on all civilians who had the +impudence to wear a uniform of any sort. Such is the behaviour of the +sterner sex at a moment when its sole thought should be of sensible and +efficient co-operation in the performance of duty. + +For of course it was our duty to co-operate with the Bluebottles. The +theory with which we beguiled ourselves, that the Bluebottles were +physically starvelings and required our Herculean aid to lift the +stretchers up the stairs, was palpably nonsense. Still we told ourselves +that we, as disciplined soldiers, were here to give a hand to a civilian +mob who might otherwise faint and fail. A singular delusion! Time has +proved its falsity, for with the issue of fresh orders our +station-parties ceased to function: the Bluebottles now make shift +without us--and without, as far as I know, any mishap. + +The hospital train was eventually signalled. We were ranked, at +attention, at the foot of the stairs. The Bluebottles stood by their +stretchers. There was hurrying hither and thither of officials. +Sometimes our Colonel, having motored from the hospital, appeared on the +platform to see that all was well, and you may be sure that we +endeavoured to look alert in his august presence. And finally the train +glided into the station. + +The hospital trains seemed to be never twice the same: South Westerns, +North Westerns, Great Northerns, Midlands, Great Centrals, Lancashire +and Yorkshires--I saw them all, at one time or another, their sole +affinity being the staring red crosses painted on each coach. A coach or +two consisted of ordinary compartments, for sitting-up cases; the rest +were vans the interiors of which had been converted into wards by means +of bunks. Access to each van-ward was gained by a wide pair of sliding +doors in its centre. These doors, when the train had come to a +standstill, were opened by pallid-looking orderlies, who lowered +gangways and then gazed forth at us, while they awaited orders, with the +lack-lustre eyes of men who had been deprived of the proper allowance of +sleep. + +As soon as the list of the Medical Officer on the train had been checked +with that of the Medical Officer on the platform, the evacuation began. +Walking-cases were sent off first--generally a tatterdemalion crew, +hobbling and shuffling along the platform, and, at one stage of the war, +with trench mud still clinging to their clothes. They seldom needed our +assistance: the Bluebottles (even if feeble folk) were deemed by our +corporal to be fit to give any weak walking patient an arm, or carry his +kit. The walking patients, in fact, were a mere episode. Motor-cars +whirled them off, five or six at a time, and they might be half through +the process of being bathed at the hospital before the last +stretcher-case was quit of the train. The stretcher cases were our +concern. Pairs of Bluebottles, each carrying a stretcher, entered the +van-wards and anon reappeared with their burden. Now came our cue to +act. As the stretcher approached the foot of the stair two of our number +stepped forth from the rank, each taking a handle from a Bluebottle; the +stretcher thus proceeded on its course up the stair carried by four men, +one on each handle--two Bluebottles and two R.A.M.C.'s. + +That flight of iron stairs from the platform to the road seemed no very +arduous ordeal for the first half-dozen journeys. There was a knack +about keeping the stretcher horizontal: the front bearers must hold +their handles as low as possible; the rear bearers must hoist their +handles shoulder-high. It was all plain sailing and perfectly easy. Four +men to a stretcher is luxurious. At least it is luxurious on the level, +and if you have not far to go and not many consecutive stretchers to +carry. But when the convoy was a large one, when the bearers were too +few and you had no sooner got rid of one stretcher than you must run +down the stairs and, without regaining your breath, grab the handle of +another and slowly toil up again to the ambulances ... yes, even on the +coldest day it was possible to be moist with perspiration; and as for +the hot weather of the 1915 summer, when one of our Big Pushes was +afoot, or when returned prisoners came from Germany (those were +memorable occasions!)--you might be pardoned a certain aching in the +arm-muscles. + +It was on one of these busy days that I discovered that the comical +prejudice of khaki against the Bluebottles was not (as I had hitherto +supposed) confined to the young swashbucklers of the home-staying +R.A.M.C. It was seldom our custom to enter the hospital trains. An +unwritten law decreed that Bluebottles only should enter the train: the +R.A.M.C. limited themselves to carrying work outside, on the platform +and stair. But on this occasion the supply of Bluebottles had, for the +moment, run short, and our party took a turn at going up the gangways +and evacuating the van-wards. As it happened, I and my mate on the +stretcher were the first khaki-wearers to invade that particular +van-ward. And as we steered our stretcher in at the door and down the +aisle of cots a shout arose from the wounded lying there: "Here are some +real soldiers!" + +It was too bad. It was base ingratitude to the devoted band of +Bluebottles who had, up till that instant, been toiling at the +evacuation of the ward--and who, as I chanced to know, had been up all +the previous night, carrying stretchers at Paddington and Charing Cross, +while _we_ slept cosily. But--well, there it was. "Here are some real +soldiers!" Khaki greeted khaki--simultaneously spurning the mere +amateur, the civilian. I could have blushed for the injustice of that +naive cry. But it would be dishonest not to confess that there was +something gratifying about it too. It was the cry of the Army, always +loyal to the Army. These heroic bundles of bandages, lifting wild and +unshaven faces from their pillows, hailed _me_ (a wretched creature who +had never heard a gun go off) as one of their comrades! My mate and I, +as we adjusted our stretcher at a cot's side, and braced ourselves +against the weight of the patient, winked covertly at one another. "A +nasty one for the Bluebottles!" he said. And it was. + +All the same I seize this opportunity of offering my homage to the +Bluebottles. They have done--are still doing--their bit, and that right +nobly. Thousands of British soldiers have cause to bless them and also +to be thankful for the existence of that great voluntary institution, +the London Ambulance Column. + + * * * * * + +When at last the train had been emptied and the ultimate stretcher was +_en route_ for the hospital, our party gathered once more at the top of +the stair, lined up, and was glanced-over by the corporal lest any man +had seized the opportunity to play truant. There were occasions when +some thirsty soul, chafing at the rigours of the strict teetotalism +enforced by our rules, was found to have vanished in the hurly-burly: +his destination, the up-platform refreshment-bar, being readily +surmisable. He had cause to regret his lapse if it were noticed before +he slipped back unostentatiously into our ranks. Then, "Party, 'shun! +Left turn! Right incline--quick march!" Off we swung, out into the +streets--cheered by the urchins who still hovered round the gate--and +so, at the rapidest possible pace, home to dinner and a smoke: these (in +my case at any rate) being preceded by the thankful relinquishment of my +seldom-worn and therefore none too friendly marching-boots. + + + + +XIV + +SLANG IN A WAR HOSPITAL + + +Every ward in the hospital has a bathroom attached to it, but in +addition to these there are two large bathrooms, each containing a +number of baths, which are used by walking patients and also by the +orderlies. The more recently built of these bathrooms is divided into +private cubicles. In the older one the baths are on a more sociable +plan, with no partition walls sundering them. The spectacle, in the +"old" bathroom, when a convoy of walking cases has arrived, is one which +should appeal to a painter. Clouds of steam fill the air, and through +the fog you perceive a fine melee of figures, some half dressed, some +statuesquely nude, towelling themselves or preparing to wash, or shaving +at bits of mirror propped on the window-sills. Pink bodies wallow +voluptuously in the deep porcelain-ware tubs, which are of the shape and +superb dimensions of Egyptian sarcophagi. Sometimes a patient with a +wounded arm, unable to help himself, is being soaped and sponged by an +orderly; or you may see a cheerful soul, with an injured foot, balanced +on the rim of the bath and giving himself all the ablutions which are +practicable without the disturbance of bandages. No one who has +frequented our bathrooms would ever doubt that the British Army loves +cleanliness and hot water. Of cold water I cannot speak with the same +enthusiasm. + +A newly-arrived convoy of course monopolises the bathroom; but +throughout the whole day, at almost any hour, you will find a patient or +two here; for by the rule of the hospital it is allowable for any +patient--once he has been given permission to take an unsupervised bath +at all--to take a bath whenever he likes. Consequently it happens often +that half a dozen orderlies may be bathing at the same time as half a +dozen patients--and it need not be added that the occasion is one for +pleasant chats and the barter of anecdotes. For this reason, if for no +other, I always elected to use the "old" bathroom: the "new" one, with +its closed cubicles, was less fruitful in conversations. + +The "old" bathroom was the exchange (and perhaps the starting-point) of +many of our hospital rumours. I imagine that every war hospital is a +hotbed of rumours. Ours certainly was, and is. Amongst the orderlies +there are incessant rumours about promotions, about the chances of the +unit being sent abroad, about surprise inspections, about the imminent +arrival of impossibly large convoys, about news--received privately by +the Colonel over the telephone--of defeats or victories. Nine times out +of ten the rumour turns out to be groundless. But this does not cause +the output of rumours to diminish. Apparently the army is a prolific +soil for rumours, inasmuch as they have a special name: a rumour is +called a _buzz_. "Only a buzz" ("it's only a rumour") is an expression +often heard on the lips of soldiers. In India it is sometimes "a bazaar +buzz" (a rumour circulating in the bazaars); here it is, naturally, a +bathroom buzz. + +Many were the choice examples of slang and of colloquialisms which I +culled in the bathroom, sitting comfortably in my bath and communing +with my neighbour in the next bath. I remember one morning making the +acquaintance of an Australian who had recently recovered from a bad +attack of trench feet. Four of the toes of one foot were missing, and +the fifth looked far from sound. My friend was examining this lonely toe +with a critical gaze, and I sympathised with him over its condition. +"Ah!" he said, "that toe is a king to what it was." He went on to tell +me (what I could well believe) that to get your "plates of meat" +frostbitten wasn't such a "cushy wound" as it was cracked up to be by +those who had never experienced its sufferings. "When I went sick the +doctor thought he'd rumbled me swinging the lead. But as soon as he +spotted them there toes of mine--the ones that's gone--I could see he +knew I'd clicked a packet, square dinkum, this trip." ("Square dinkum" +or "dinkum" is an Antipodean verbal flourish, which broadly +approximates to the American "Sure enough" or the English "Not 'arf.") + +Certain of these neologisms are common enough in civilian life--have +been imported into the army since 1914--but others (and the more +interesting ones, as I hold) were, until the war, limited to the +barrack-room. British regiments which had been abroad used an argot of +considerable antiquity, some of it of Oriental origin (_e.g._ "blighty," +meaning "home": hence "a blighty wound," or simply "a blighty," an +injury sufficiently serious to cause the victim to be invalided to +England). Whether the derivations of army slang have been investigated I +do not know. It appears to me to be a subject worth examination. I am +not myself a philologist, but in the bathrooms and elsewhere in the +hospital I have heard and noted a small collection of slang phrases and +idioms, and these may be worth recording. Such expressions as "swinging +the lead" (malingering or deceiving or acting in a hypocritical manner +or getting the better of anyone) have lost their novelty. So has +"rumbled," which means to be discovered or detected or found out. These +words have now spread far beyond the confines of the army. And indeed +the rapidity with which all slang and all catch-phrases can be +disseminated offers a rather alarming prospect. For whereas, before the +war, slang at its silliest was often quite local, nowadays its +restriction within given localities has in the nature of things become +impossible. A war hospital such as ours contains inmates from every +county in Britain, as well as from every colony. The same intermingling +occurs on an infinitely greater scale in training-camps and at the +various fronts. All these centres are hotbeds of slang: the men go home +from them, carrying to their native places slang which would never, in +ordinary times, have penetrated there. In the army you will hear a +Scotchman doing what he never did before--dropping his aitches. He has +caught it from his English comrades. You will hear him say "Not +'arf"--an inane tag which, despite its popularity in London, failed to +find any foothold north of the Tweed before the war. "Not 'arf" was +mouthed by Sassenach comedians on the music-hall stages of Edinburgh +and Glasgow, and was grinned at for what it was worth: the streets did +not adopt it. Now the streets will hear it and will use it: it is one of +Jock's souvenirs from his campaign. + +I am afraid that another triviality which has hitherto been to the taste +only of the south of England is fated to "catch on," by means of the +same missionaries, from Land's End to John o' Groat's, and even in the +colonies. Rhyming slang is extraordinarily common in the army, so common +that it is used with complete unconsciousness as being correct +conversational English. My friend of the king-like toe spoke of his feet +as "plates of meat"--and this though he was an Australian, not a +cockney. If he had had occasion to allude to his leg he would probably +have called it "Scotch peg." A man's arm is his "false alarm"; his nose, +"I suppose"; his eye, "mince pie"; his hand, "German band"; his boot, +"daisy root"; his face "chevvy chase"; and so forth--an interminable +list. What exactly was the _raison d'etre_ of this pseudo-poetic mania I +do not know, but I suspect that it originated, in the distant past, +with the poverty of rhyme-invention on the part of the writers of the +cruder kind of pantomime songs--"round the houses," for example, being +both a rhyme to and a synonym for "trousies" (garments beloved of those +bards!)--and thus the vogue developed. This is only a theory. The one +thing certain is that a clumsy form of slang, devoid of the humour and +compactness which justify slang--and which were on the whole once +characteristic of metropolitan slang--has tickled the ear of some +millions of men who, but for the war, would never have fallen under its +temptation. The only thing to hope for is that it will run its course +and perish--like "What ho, she bumps!" and "Now we shan't be +long!"--without leaving any visible and permanent trace upon the +language. + +"Clicked," another word used by my trench-feet associate, resembles much +modern slang in the breadth and elasticity of its application. To click +can be either advantageous or baneful, according to the circumstances. A +soldier asks a superior for a favour, and it is granted. That soldier +has clicked. Or if he finds a nice girl to walk out with, he has +clicked. Or if he is given a coveted post, he has clicked. But he has +also clicked if he is suddenly seized on to do some menial duty. He has +clicked if he is discovered in a misdeed. And he has clicked a packet if +he gets into trouble generally. On such an occasion, it may be added, +the N.C.O. or officer who administers a reproof ("ticks him off"), and +does so in angry terms, "goes in off the deep end." + +Not all army slang is lacking, indeed, in a facetious irony. Miserable +conditions in the desert or in the trenches, bad accommodation, doubtful +food--anything which cannot arouse the faintest enthusiasm of any +sort--these, in the lingo of our now much-travelled and stoical troops, +are "nothing to write home about." Surely there is an admirable spirit +in this sarcasm. It crops up again in the hospital metaphor "going to +the pictures." That is Tommy's way of announcing that he is to go under +the surgeon's knife, on a visit to the operating theatre. Again, there +is a sardonic tang in the army's condemnation of one who has been +telling a far-fetched story: he has been "chancing his arm" (or "mit"). +Similarly one detects an oblique and wry fun in the professional army +man's use of the word "sieda" to mean "socks." (The new army more feebly +dubs them "almond rocks.") "Sieda" has been brought by the Anzacs from +Cairo, and with them it means "Good morning!"--a mere friendly hail, now +used with great frequency. But the veterans of older expeditions in +Egypt and in India, when they had been on the march, took their socks +from their perspiring feet and lay down to sleep; and in the +morning--well, their socks said "Sieda!" to them when they awoke, and +were christened accordingly.... Or again, the socks (or other property) +might have vanished in the night--in which case there had been "hooks +about" (pilferers about). If one of those "hooks" were caught, he would +be first "rammed in the mush" (put in the guardroom), and then, if his +guilt were established, he would be observed "going over the wall" or +"going to stir" (going to the detention prison). + +A few other slang words which I have come across in the hospital, and +which seem to me to bear the mark of the old army as distinct from the +new, are: "bondook," a rifle; "sound scoff" (to the bugler, to sound +Rations); "scran," victuals, rations; "weighing out," paying out; +"chucking a dummy," being absent; "get the wind up," be afraid (and "put +the wind up," make afraid); "the home farm," the married quarters; +"chips," the pioneer sergeant (carpenter); "tank," wet canteen; +"tank-wallah," a drinker; "tanked," drunk; "A.T.A. wallah," a +teetotaller (from the Army Temperance Association); "on the cot" or "on +the tack," being teetotal; "jammy," lucky (and "jam," any sort of good +fortune); "win," to steal; "burgoo," porridge; "eye-wash," making things +outwardly presentable; "gone west," died (also applied to things broken, +_e.g._ a broken pipe has "gone west"); "oojah," anything (similar to +thingummy or what-d'ye-call-it); "push," "pusher," or "square push," a +girl (hence "square-push tunic," the "swagger" tunic for walking-out +occasions). The words for drunkenness are innumerable--"jingled," +"oiled," "tanked to the wide," "well sprung," "up the pole," "blotto," +etc.; but I smell the modern in some of these; their flavour is of +London taverns rather than of the dusty barrack squares of India, Egypt, +Malta, and Gibraltar. + +But who can delve to the ultimate springs of slang? A verb which I never +met before I enlisted was "to spruce." This is almost, if not quite, a +blend of "swinging the lead" and "doing a mike." To spruce is to dodge +duty or to deceive. A man who contrived to slip out of the ranks of a +squad when they were performing some distasteful task would be said to +"spruce off." Or he would be denounced as a "sprucer" if he managed to +arrive late for his meal and yet, by a trick, to secure a front place in +the waiting queue at the canteen. A word in constant employment, +"spruce"! It was new to me when I became an orderly, and for a long time +I thought that it was peculiar to our unit, in the same manner that the +jargon of certain boys is peculiar to certain schools. But I concluded +later that it might have a remote and roundabout origin in the old army +slang, "a spruce hand" at "brag"--the latter being a variant of the game +of poker, and a spruce hand, apparently, one which, held by a bluffer, +contained cards of no real value. + +Some day these etymological mysteries must be probed. Perhaps the German +professors, after the war, can usefully wreak themselves on this complex +and obscure research. Meanwhile the above notes are offered not as a +serious contribution to a subject so immense, but rather as a warning. +The infectiousness of slang is incredible; and this gigantic +inter-association of classes and clans has brought about a hitherto +unheard-of levelling-down of the common speech. Accent may or may not be +influenced: the vocabulary undoubtedly is. Nearly every home in the land +is soon going to be invaded by many forms of army slang: the process in +fact has already begun. If we were a sprightlier nation the effect might +not be all to the bad. But most of our slang-mongers are not wits. "He +was balmy a treat," I heard a soldier say of another soldier who had +shammed insane. That is what we are coming to: it is the tongue we +shall use and likewise (I fear) the condition in which some of us will +find ourselves as a result. + + + + +XV + +A BLIND MAN'S HOME-COMING + + +In my boyhood I had the ambition--it was one of several ambitions--to +become a courier. The _Morning Post_ advertisements of couriers who +professed to be fluent in a number of languages and were at the disposal +of invalid aristocrats desiring to take extensive (and expensive) trips +abroad, aroused the most romantic visions in my mind. A courier's was +the life for me. I saw myself whirling all over Europe--with my +distinguished invalid--in sleeping-cars de luxe. Anon we were crossing +the Atlantic or lolling in punkah-induced breezes on the verandahs of +Far Eastern hotels. It was a great profession, that of the experienced +and successful courier. + +I have never been a courier in quite this picturesque acceptation; and +yet, in a humbler sense, I have perhaps (to my own surprise) earned the +title. As an R.A.M.C. orderly I have more than once officiated as +travelling courier--yes, and to distinguished, if far from affluent, +invalids. They ought, at least, to rank as distinguished; for the reason +they needed a courier was because they had given their health, or limbs, +or eyesight, in defence of their country. + +It happens only too often that when a patient is discharged from +hospital he is not fit to make his journey home alone. An orderly is +detailed to accompany him. Sometimes the lot has fallen on me. Generally +the trip is a short one, to some outlying suburb of London or to some +town or village in the home counties; but sometimes my flights have been +further afield, to Ireland, or Wales; and once I went to Yorkshire with +a blind man. + +That Yorkshire expedition was singularly lacking in drama and in surface +pathos, yet its details remain with great clearness. The piece of +damaged goods which, being of no further fighting use, was being +returned with thanks to the hearthside from whence it came, was an +individual answering to the unheroic cognomen of Briggs. A +high-explosive shell had been sent by the Gods to alter the current of +Briggs's career. Briggs came through all that part of the war which +concerned him without a scratch upon his person--only after the arrival +in his immediate vicinity of the high-explosive shell he was +unfortunately unable to see. Never again would Briggs be of the +slightest value either as a soldier or in his civilian trade, which was +that of driver of ponies in a coal-mine. Consequently, as a +distinguished invalid (with the sum of one pound in his pocket to +comfort him until such time as his pension should materialise), +Mister--no longer Private--Briggs, for the first and presumably the last +time in his existence, went travelling with a courier. + +A car supplied by the National Motor Volunteer Service awaited Briggs +and his courier at the hospital entrance. Here the introduction between +Briggs and his courier took place. Ours is a large hospital, and I had +never to my knowledge encountered Briggs before that moment. I beheld a +young fellow (he was only twenty-three) with a stout, healthy visage +which wore a pleasant smile and would have been describable as roguish, +only ... well, the eyes of a blind man, whatever else they are, are not +conducive to a roguish mien. They were eyes not visibly damaged: nice +blue eyes. And they stared at nothingness. I was in the presence of a +stripling who, a few weeks ago, must have owned a mobile face, and was +in rapid process of developing a quite different face, a face which +still might--it certainly did--grin and laugh, but which would gradually +gain, had already begun to gain, a set expressionlessness that overlaid +and strangely neutralised its grins and its laughter. + +Blind men's faces may have beauty, even vivacity, or a heightened +intelligence and fire; but there is a something, hard to define, of +which they are sadly devoid. The windows of the soul are dimmed. The +face inevitably changes. And if even I, who knew not Briggs, could +perceive that Briggs's face must thus have changed, how much more +conspicuous would the change be to the partner whom Briggs had left +seven months before and to whom I was now leading him back--his wife. + +Briggs, a civilian once more, sported reach-me-down garments which +fitted him surprisingly--our Clothing Store sergeant is the kindest of +souls and expends infinite patience on doing his best, with +government-contract tailoring, to suit all our discharges. His overcoat, +which might have been called a Chesterfield in Shoreditch, pleased +Briggs, as he told me in the car: he drew my attention to its texture +and warmth, he admiringly fingered it. "I might ha' paid thirty bob for +that there top-coat," he surmised. "A collar an' a tie an' all, too! +Them boots ain't so dusty, neither: they fit me a treat. Goin' 'ome to +my missus in Sunday clobber, I am." You would have said that he thought +he had emerged from his hazards with rather a good bargain. A jumble of +ready-made clothes--and a pension! The visible world gone for ever! +These were his souvenirs of the great war. And, "Ah," he said, when I +ventured on some allusion to his blindness, "it might ha' bin worse. I +don' know what I'd ha' done if I'd lost a leg, same as some of them +other poor jossers in th' hospital!" + +(And this, marvellous though it sounds, is the standpoint of no small +number in the legion of our Briggses.) + +The motor ride was another source of gratification to Briggs. Seated +beside me, the wind beating on his sightless orbs, he discoursed of the +wonders of petrol. "Proper to take you about, them cars. W'ere are we +now? 'Ave we far to run, like?" I told him we were traversing Battersea +Park and that our destination was St. Pancras. It transpired that he was +a stranger to London. This drive through London was, as it were, an item +in his collection of experiences, to be preserved with the cross-channel +voyage and the vigils in the trenches. "Shall we go by Buckingham +Palace?" I told him we shouldn't; then, observing that he was +disappointed, I asked the driver to make the detour. So at last I was +able to inform Briggs that we were passing Buckingham Palace: I turned +his head so that he looked straight towards that architectural +phenomenon. It was, of course, invisible to him. No matter. He wished to +be able to boast, to his wife, that he had seen (he used that verb) the +house where the King lived. + +His wife--he married a month before he enlisted--had been notified of +his return; but I suggested that at St. Pancras we might telegraph to +her the actual hour of the train's arrival, in case she should desire to +meet it. The idea commended itself to Briggs: he had not thought of such +a thing: telegraphing had perhaps hardly come within his purview, at +least so I surmised when, the telegraph-form before me, I asked him what +he wished me to write. He began cheerily, as though dictating a letter +of gossip:--"_My dear wife_--" Economy necessitated a taboo of this +otherwise charming method of communication. "_Arriving Bradford +five-thirty, Tom_," was the result of final boilings-down, which took so +long that we nearly achieved the anticlimax of missing our train +altogether. + +Now at Bradford (at the end of one of the chattiest five hours I ever +spent in my life) no Mrs. Briggs was perceptible. I kept my patient on +the platform until every other passenger had gone: I marched him up and +down the main area of the station. Each time I caught sight of a woman +who looked a possible Mrs. Briggs I steered my charge into her vicinity. +In spite of a piece of information which Briggs had imparted to me on +the journey--namely, that he expected soon to become a father--I was +surprised that his wife had not come to the station to welcome him. +However, it was plain that Briggs himself was not particularly +surprised, nor, what was more important, disappointed. Nothing could +damp his eternal placidity and good humour. He proposed that from this +point onward he should pursue his journey alone. "Nowt to do but git on +th' tram," he said. "It's a fair step from 'ere, but I knows every inch +of t' way." At all events (as of course I could not allow this) he would +now act as my guide. And he did. "First to the right.... Now we're goin' +by a big watchmaker's-and-jeweller's.... Now cross t' street.... Now on +th' corner over there by t' Sinnemer is w'ere we git our tram." + +The tram in due course appeared, and we boarded it. "Tha mun pay +thrippence only, mind," he warned me when the conductor came round. +"It's a rare long ride for thrippence." So it proved to be--through +wildernesses which were half meadow and half slum, my cicerone at every +hundred yards pointing out the notable features of the landscape. On our +left I ought to see the so-and-so public house; on our right the +football ground--I should know it by the grand-stand jutting above the +palings; further on were brickworks; further still a factory which, my +nose would have told me, even if Mr. Briggs had not, dealt with +chemicals; then, on the skyline, a pit-head; then another; then a mining +village with three different kinds of methodist church and two picture +palaces; then a gap of dreary, dirty fields. And then, nearing dusk, the +village where my friend lived, and where also was the terminus of the +tram route. + +We quitted the tram and walked down a street of those squalid brick +tenements which coal-mining seems to germinate like a rash upon the +earth's surface. The debris and the scaffoldings of pits were dotted +about the adjacent countryside. Sooty cabbage-patches occupied the +occasional interspaces in the ranks of houses. Briggs directed me across +a cinder path in one of these cabbage-patches. "See them three 'ouses at +the bottom of the 'ill? The end one's mine." We approached. No sign of +the wife. Surely she would be on the look-out for her husband? Also +there was a sister and a brother-in-law--the latter in a prosperous way +of business as a grocer near-by: Briggs had told me of them. Would not +they be watching for him? I began to be anxious. Not once, but several +times, I had heard of the wounded soldier returning to his home and +finding no home: both home and wife had gone. (Those are bitterly tragic +tales, which a realist must write some day.) Still, as we came nearer, I +saw nobody at the cottage door. "Is th' door open?" asked Briggs. Yes, +it was open. When we were at the end of the cabbage-patch, and I could +discern the interior of the cottage parlour (into which the door opened +direct), it became clear that three persons were there. One of them, a +man, obviously the brother-in-law, came and peeped out of the window at +us, and turned and spoke to his companions. Of these two, both women, +one rose from her chair and the other remained seated. But none of the +three came to the door. + +I have met northern dourness and the inarticulate manner which is such a +contrast to the gushing and noisy effusion of the south. By a paradox it +is not inconsistent with the familiar conversationalism to which Briggs +had treated me, a stranger. But I admit I found Briggs's family circle a +little embarrassing. They were respectable people: the cottage was neat +and decently furnished, its occupants were sprucely dressed. I fancy +they were in their best clothes; certainly their demeanour--and the +aspect of the table in their midst--denoted a great occasion. This +table, as I saw when I assisted Briggs up the steps into the room, had +indeed borne a well-spread tea. No very acute powers of deduction were +required to decide, from the crumbs on the white cloth and on the +dishes, that there _had_ been bread and butter and jam and cake. Of +these not a vestige (except the crumbs) remained. Briggs and I were an +hour behindhand, and the relatives who awaited the wanderer had eaten +the banquet laid to welcome him: or so it appeared. I have no doubt that +all sorts of delicacies were in the cupboard; the kettle on the hob was +probably on the boil; perhaps buttered toast was in the oven. The fact +remains that devastation was on the table. + +However, Briggs did not see the table, and the table's state occupied me +only for a fraction of a second. I was more concerned with the three +people in the parlour and with their reception of my patient. The pale +woman in the chair by the fire was evidently Briggs's wife. She stared +at us, as we entered, but said absolutely nothing. Nor did the other and +slightly younger woman, his sister, say anything. She too stared. And +the man stared, and said nothing. + +"Well, here we are," I announced--an imbecile assertion, but I produced +it as cheerfully and matter-of-factly as I knew how. I unhooked my arm +from Briggs's, and made as though to push him forward into the family +group. + +"Nay!" said Briggs. "I mun take my top-coat off first." + +I helped him off with his coat. Not one of the three members of his +family had either moved or spoken--beyond one faint murmur, not an +actual word, in response to my "Here we are." But Briggs seemed to know +that his folk were in the room with him, and he neither accosted them, +expressed any curiosity about them, or betrayed any astonishment at +their silence. + +When he had got his coat off I expected him to move forward into the +room. A mistake. Mine must be a hasty temperament. They don't do things +like that in Yorkshire, not even when they have come home blinded from +the wars. Briggs put out his hand, felt for the cottage door, half +closed it, felt for a nail on the inner side of it, and carefully hung +his coat thereon. + +_Now_ I could usher him into the waiting family circle. + +No. I was wrong. + +Briggs calmly divested himself of his jacket. He then felt for another +door, a door which opened on to a stair leading to the upper storey. On +a nail in this door he hung his jacket. And then, in his shirt-sleeves, +he was ready. Shirt-sleeves were symbolical. He was home at last, and +prepared to sit down with his people. + +Of the actual reunion I saw nothing, for I promptly said I must go. It +was imperative for me to hurry back, or I should miss my train. + +"You'll stay an' take a sup of tea with us," said Briggs. + +I couldn't, though I should have liked to do so, in some ways, and in +others should have hardly dared to be an intruder on such a meeting. I +shook hands with my patient. Looking back as I went out of the door I +saw Briggs's wife still seated, motionless, in her chair. She had not +opened her lips. It was impossible to divine what were her emotions. She +was very pale. There were no tears in her eyes as she stared at her +young blind husband. But I think there were tears waiting to be shed. + +I looked back again when I reached the end of the path across the +cabbage-patch. The cottage door was still open. In the aperture stood +the younger of the two women, Briggs's sister. She waved to me and +smiled. It was evident that it had struck her that I ought to have been +thanked for my services, and she was expressing this, cordially if +belatedly. I waved my hand in return, and hastened up the street towards +the tram. + +My hurry was fruitless. I missed my train in Bradford, and stayed the +night at an hotel, thus (with appropriate but improper extravagance) +concluding this particular performance in the role of travelling courier +to a distinguished invalid. As I sat over a sumptuous table d'hote--this +was long before the submarine blockade and the food restrictions--I +wondered what Briggs's wife said to Briggs; and I made up a story about +it. But what I have written above is not a story, it is the unadorned +truth, which I could not have invented and which is perhaps better than +the story. In his courier's presence Briggs addressed not one word to +his wife, and his wife addressed not one word to him; nor did his sister +or his brother-in-law. Nor did any of this trio address one word to me. + + +PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY HAZELL, WATSON AND VINEY, LD., LONDON AND +AYLESBURY, FOR SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT & CO., LTD. + + + + * * * * * + + + +Popular 1/-net Novels + + +"_'Arf a Mo', Pinky!_" + +Private Pinkerton, Millionaire + +By HAROLD ASHTON + +The rollicking adventures of Pte. Pinkerton, Millionaire, and his pal, +that irrepressible and courageous soldier, Pte. William Bailey--"Bill," +to his friends--ex-burglar, humorist, and all-round sportsman. + + +Phillip in Particular + +By W. DOUGLAS NEWTON + +(_Phillip, with two "l's" please, and said slowly._) Has delighted +thousands of our boys in the Army. + + +Gloria. 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By post 5s. 4d. + +"These stories of the great war make the great tragedy to pass clear and +vivid before the reader's eye. His purpose has been to make real to +those at home the endurance and the heroism of our soldiers, and in this +he has perfectly succeeded. We need books such as this to keep us awake +to the horrors of these days. For there is a danger of becoming +acclimatised even to the brutalities of war."--_Scotsman._ + + +Mud and Khaki + +By VERNON BARTLETT + +3s. 6d. net. By post 3s. 10d. + +"A very clever and enjoyable collection of sketches picturing the +character of the fighting men in the trenches, the tragedy and the +farce, the humour, and the elementary humanity that crudely jostle each +other in his life."--_Globe._ + +"There is much humour and some pathos, and always reality and the +splendid spirit of the British Soldier in them."--_Westminster Gazette._ + +"Sketches from Flanders and France. The humorous and pathetic are well +blended in these brightly written sketches."--_Glasgow Herald._ + +"Simply written, but the intensely human descriptions of the life of the +soldier compels attention."--_Everyman._ + + +Oh, Canada! + +A Budget of Stories and Pictures by Members of the Canadian +Expeditionary Force + +3s. net. By post 3s. 5d. + +_Send a copy to a friend in Canada._ + +"A lively and varied collection, with not a dull page."--_The Times._ + +"'Oh, Canada!' deserves a hearty welcome, not only for its patriotic +aims, but for its own intrinsic worth. 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