of silence, and is by no means easy of access.  If he is a high official, a series of ante-rooms is interposed between his sacred person and an inquisitive world.  But in Belgium everyone walks straight in without removing his cigar.  The great man sits at his desk surrounded by a perfect Babel, but he is always polite, always ready to hear what you have to say and to do what he can to help.  He appears to be able to deal with half a dozen different problems at the same time without ever being ruffled or confused.  There is an immense amount of talking and shaking of hands, and at first the brain of a mere Englishman is apt to whirl; but the business is done rapidly and completely.  Belgium is above all things democratic, and our office was a good introduction to it.

The common room was large and airy, overlooking the courtyard, and a few rugs and armchairs made it a very comfortable place when the work of the day was done.  Anyone who has worked in a hospital will know what a difference such a room makes to the work—­work that must be carried on at all hours of the day or night; nor will he need to be told of the constant supply of tea and coffee that will be found there.  We go about telling our patients of the evils of excessive tea-drinking, and we set them an example they would find it hard to follow.  We do not mention how often tea and a hot bath have been our substitute for a night’s sleep.’  A good common room and an unlimited supply of tea will do much to oil the wheels of hospital life.

But to myself the all-important room was the operating theatre, for upon its resources depended entirely our opportunities for surgical work.  It was in every way admirable, and I know plenty of hospitals in London whose theatres would not bear comparison with ours.  Three long windows faced the courtyard; there was a great bunch of electric lights in the ceiling, and there was a constant supply of boiling water.  What more could the heart of surgeon desire?  There were two operating tables and an equipment of instruments to vie with any in a London hospital.  Somebody must have been very extravagant over those instruments, I thought as I looked at them; but he was right and I was wrong, for there were very few of those instruments for which I was not grateful before long.  The surgery of war is a very different thing from the surgery of home.

The wards were full when we arrived, and I had a wonderful opportunity of studying the effects of rifle and shell fire.  Most of the wounds were fortunately slight, but some of them were terrible, and, indeed, in some cases it seemed little short of miraculous that the men had survived.  But on every side one saw nothing but cheerful faces, and one would never have dreamt what some of those men had gone through.  They were all smoking cigarettes, laughing, and chatting, as cheery a set of fellows as one could meet.  You would never have suspected that a few days before those same men had been carried into the hospital