ailed this suggestion
as a most brilliant and original idea.

As the Flamand was brought into the village, the Ambulance had got its
wounded in, and was ready to go. But he had to have his wound dressed.

He lay there on his stretcher in the middle of the village street, my
beloved Flamand, stripped to the waist, with the great red pit of his
wound yawning in his white flesh. I had to look on while the Commandant
stuffed it with antiseptic gauze.

I had always supposed that the dressing of a wound was a cautious and
delicate process. But it isn't. There is a certain casual audacity about
it. The Commandant's hands worked rapidly as he rammed cyanide gauze
into the red pit. It looked as if he were stuffing an old crate with
straw. And it was all over in a moment. There seemed something indecent
in the haste with which my Flamand was disposed of.

When the Commandant observed that my Flamand's wound looked much worse
than it was, I felt hurt, as if this beloved person had been slighted;
also as if there was some subtle disparagement to my "find."

I rather hoped that we were going to wait till the men I had left behind
in the plantation had come up. But the car was fairly full, and Ursula
Dearmer and Janet and Mrs. Lambert were told off to take it in to Z----,
leave the wounded there and come back for the rest. I was to walk to
Z---- and wait there for the returning car.

Nothing would have pleased me better, but the distance was farther than
the Commandant realized, farther, perhaps, than was desirable in the
circumstances, so I was ordered to get on the car and come back with it.

(Tom the chauffeur is perfectly right. There are too many of us.)

We got away long before the Germans turned the corner, if they ever did
turn it. In Z----, which is half-way between Lokeren and Ghent, we came
upon six or seven fine military ambulances, all huddled together as if
they sought safety in companionship (why none of them had been sent up
to our village I can't imagine). Ursula Dearmer, with admirable
presence of mind, commandeered one of these and went back with it to the
village, so that we could take our load of wounded into Ghent. We did
this, and went back at once.

The return journey was a tame affair. Before we got to Z---- we met the
Commandant and the Chaplain and two refugees, in Mr. Lambert's
scouting-car, towed by a motor-wagon. It had broken down on the way from
Lokeren. We took them on board and turned back t