ble wrist in playing had given
her only a meagre training for the stresses of the modern battlefield.
Once she had fainted when a favorite aunt had fallen from a trolley car.
And she had left the room when a valued friend had attacked a stiff loaf
of bread with a crust that turned the edge of the knife into his hand.
She had not then made her peace with bloodshed and suffering.

On the Strand, London, there was a group of alert professional women,
housed in a theatre building, and known as the Women's Crisis League.
To their office she took her way, determined to enlist for Belgium. Mrs.
Bracher was in charge of the office--a woman with a stern chin, and an
explosive energy, that welcomed initiative in newcomers.

"It's a poor time to get pupils," said the fair-haired Hilda, "I don't
want to go back to the Studio Club in New York, as long as there's more
doing over here. I'm out of funds, but I want to work."

"Are you a trained nurse?" asked Mrs. Bracher, who was that, as well as
a motor cyclist and a woman of property, a certificated midwife, and a
veterinarian.

"Not even a little bit," replied Hilda, "but I'm ready to do dirty work.
There must be lots to do for an untrained person, who is strong and used
to roughing it. I'll catch hold all right, if you'll give me the
chance."

"Right, oh," answered Mrs. Bracher. "Dr. Neil McDonnell is shortly
leaving for Belgium with a motor-ambulance Corps," she said, "but he has
hundreds of applications, and his list is probably completed."

"Thank you," said Hilda, "that will do nicely."

"I don't mind telling you," continued Mrs. Bracher, "that I shall
probably go with him to the front. I hope he will accept you, but there
are many ahead of you in applying, and he has already promised more than
he can take."

Hilda took a taxi from St. Mary Le Strand to Harley Street. Dr. Neil
McDonnell was a dapper mystical little specialist, who was renowned for
his applications of psychotherapy to raging militants and weary society
leaders. He was a Scottish Highlander, with a rare gift of intuitive
insight. He, too, had the agreeable quality of personal charm. Like all
to whom the gods have been good, he looked with a favoring eye on the
spectacle of youth.

"You come from a country which will one day produce the choicest race in
history," he began, "you have a blend of nationalities. We have a little
corner in Scotland where several strains were merged, and the men were
finer an