make out what had happened; but at last I made one of them tell me quietly.  It appeared that when the wagons got down to Charleroi station, the men were unloaded and put on stretchers, and were about to be carried into the station when an officer came and pointed a pistol at them (why, no one knew, for they were only obeying orders), and said they were to wait.  So they waited there outside the station for a long time, guarded by a squad of German soldiers, and at last were told that the train to Germany was already full and that they must return to the hospital.  They all had to be got back into bed (into our disinfected beds, with the last of the clean sheets!) and fed and their dressings done, and so on, and they were so excited that it took a long time before they could settle down for the night.  But it was a very short reprieve, for the next day they had to go off again and there was no coming back this time.

I often think of those poor lads in Germany and wonder what has become of them, and if those far-off mothers all think their sons are dead.  If so, what a joyful surprise some of them will have some day—­after the war.

IV

THE RETURN TO BRUSSELS

This seemed a favourable moment for me to go to Brussels for a day or two to visit my flock.  The Committee gave me leave to go, but begged me to be back in two days, which I promised to do.  A laissez-passer had been obtained from the German commandant for a Red Cross automobile to go into Brussels to fetch some supplies of dressings and bandages of which all the hospitals in the neighbourhood were woefully short.  And I was also graciously accorded a ticket of leave by the same august authority to go for two days, which might be extended to three according to the length of stay of the automobile.

The night before I left, an aeroplane which had been flying very high above the town dropped some papers.  The doctor with whom I was lodging secured one and brought it back triumphantly.  It contained a message from the Burgomaster of Antwerp to his fellow-citizens, and ended thus:  “Courage, fellow-citizens, in a fortnight our country will be delivered from the enemy.”

We were all absurdly cheered by this message, and felt that it was only a matter of a short time now before the Germans were driven out of Belgium.  We had had no news for so long that we thought probably the Antwerp Burgomaster had information of which we knew nothing, and I was looking forward to hearing some good news when I got to Brussels.