er
shapes. Shrapnel burst all round them, and then the Zepps. seemed
suddenly to become alive, and they answered with machine guns, and the
patter of bullets and shrapnel could be heard all around. The Commander
of one of the Zepps. apparently fearing his airship might be hit, must
have given the order for all the bombs to be heaved overboard at once,
for suddenly twenty-one fell simultaneously! You can imagine what a
sight it was to see those golden balls of fire falling through the air
from the silver airship. They fell in a field just outside the town near
a little village called _Les Barraques_, the total bag being five cows!

In spite of the three Zeppelins the Huns only succeeded in killing a
baby and an old lady. At last they were successfully driven off, and we
settled down hoping our excitements were over for the night, but no, at
3.30 a.m. the tocsin again rang out a third alarm! This was getting
beyond a joke. The air duel recommenced, bombs were dropped, but
fortunately no serious casualties occurred. Luckily at that time none of
the patients were in a serious condition, so we felt that for once the
Hun had been fairly considerate. It was surprising to find the
comparatively little damage the town had suffered. We had several others
after this, but they are not worth recording here.

One patient we had at that time was a Dutchman who had joined the
Belgian Army in 1914. He was a very droll fellow, and told me he was the
clown at one of the Antwerp Theatres and kept the people amused while
the scenes were being changed. I can quite believe this, for shouts of
laughter could always be heard in his vicinity. He was very good at
imitating animals, and I discovered later that among other
accomplishments he was also a ventriloquist. Sister and I, when the
necessary feeds had been given, used to sit in two deck chairs with a
screen shading the light, near the stove in the middle ward, until the
next were due. One night I heard a cat mewing. It seemed to be almost
under my chair, I got up and looked everywhere. Yes, there it was again,
but this time coming from under one of the men's beds. It was a piteous
mew, and I was determined to find it. I spent a quarter of an hour on
tiptoe looking everywhere. It was not till I heard a stifled chuckle
from the bed next the Dutchman's that I suspected anything, and then,
determined they should get no rise out of me, sat down quietly in my
chair again. Though that cat mewed f