he other stretcher-bearers.

I was in one of the ambulances, and Mr. Gleeson sat behind me in the
narrow space between the stretchers. Over his shoulder he talked in a
quiet voice of the job that lay before us. I was glad of that quiet
voice, so placid in its courage. We went forward at what seemed to me a
crawl, though I think it was a fair pace, shells bursting around us now
on all sides, while shrapnel bullets sprayed the earth about us. It
appeared to me an odd thing that we were still alive. Then we came into
Dixmude.

When I saw it for the first and last time it was a place of death and
horror. The streets through which we passed were utterly deserted and
wrecked from end to end, as though by an earthquake. Incessant
explosions of shell fire crashed down upon the walls which still stood.
Great gashes opened in the walls, which then toppled and fell. A roof
came tumbling down with an appalling clatter. Like a house of cards
blown by a puff of wind, a little shop suddenly collapsed into a mass of
ruins. Here and there, further into the town, we saw living figures.
They ran swiftly for a moment and then disappeared into dark caverns
under toppling porticos. They were Belgian soldiers.

We were now in a side street leading into the Town Hall square. It
seemed impossible to pass, owing to the wreckage strewn across the road.
"Try to take it," said Dr. Munro, who was sitting beside the chauffeur.
We took it, bumping over heaps of debris, and then swept around into the
square. It was a spacious place, with the Town Hall at one side of
it--or what was left of the Town Hall; there was only the splendid shell
of it left, sufficient for us to see the skeleton of a noble building
which had once been the pride of Flemish craftsmen. Even as we turned
toward it parts of it were falling upon the ruins already on the ground.
I saw a great pillar lean forward and then topple down. A mass of
masonry crashed from the portico. Some stiff, dark forms lay among the
fallen stones; they were dead soldiers. I hardly glanced at them, for we
were in search of the living.

Our cars were brought to a halt outside the building, and we all climbed
down. I lighted a cigarette, and I noticed two of the other men fumble
for matches for the same purpose. We wanted something to steady our
nerves. There was never a moment when shell fire was not bursting in
that square. Shrapnel bullets whipped the stones. The Germans were
making a target of the T