were other hospitals at Amara for officers and men and improvements
were being added daily.

There was a large number of hospitals in Basrah and a very fine one
called the Beit Naama Hospital about six miles below Basrah,
beautifully situated on the banks of the river and surrounded by palm
trees, was opened in June 1916 to try and relieve the pressure of
officers coming down river, which No. 3 British General Hospital could
not easily cope with. This place was fitted up with electric light and
electric fans, hot and cold water baths, lift, ice and soda water
factories, up-to-date "X" Ray installation and an Operating Theatre
for surgical cases.

They took in on an average about 135 officers a month and sent on an
average 28 to India. It had accommodation for 100 officers and had a
staff of three Medical Officers, a Matron and seven Sisters. The work
done by the Nursing Sisters in this country, the untiring devotion to
duty displayed under most trying climatic conditions when the
temperature rose to nearly 130 degrees in the shade, is beyond all
praise, and only those who have seen and suffered in this campaign
should be competent to judge.

[Illustration: The Second In Command.]

[Illustration: The Doctor In The Trenches.]

[Illustration: Amongst The Palm Trees.]

CHAPTER V.

All these improvements, all these reinforcements, all these extra
supplies could have but one meaning and but one end in view, and that
was as soon as the summer heat was over in the words of Nelson's
famous signal to "engage the enemy more closely."

The time spent out of the trenches was no holiday, one talked of going
back to the Rest Camp. But Rest Camp was only a kindly term; it did
not mean, as one might be led to believe, a delightful camp where
comfortable chairs and well-served meals were supplied to tired and
war-worn officers and men. No such thing; in fact so much the opposite
was the case that one often heard it remarked that one got far more
rest in the trenches than in any Rest Camp at the immediate front. The
Colonel of the Regiment was a thruster. He never wasted a moment
himself and would have his regiment the same. On the great Bronze Gong
of one of our Battalions is engraved "I mark the hours, Do you?"
Certainly the Colonel of the 2nd Battalion did. It was too hot for any
drill or outside parades between the hours of 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., so
everyone gasped for air inside their tents during those awful hours
w