antiquarian gait suited me, and this was the smoothest of the many
torturous forms of travel I endured before I was able once again to
move up-rightly on my feet as a man should.

At Trones Wood I was swung into a horse ambulance and thereafter swung
and swayed for a couple of hours until, closing my eyes, I could fancy
I was once again at sea. This was rougher than the sledge, but
endurable and certainly the most comfortable of all the wheeled
vehicles in which I travelled. I bless the inventor of the springs
that kept it swaying gently on a road all ruts and holes.

I was deposited on the table of the operating-theatre in the
field-ambulance, while a surgeon overhauled me to see if there was any
injury necessitating an immediate operation. Satisfied that I was
merely broken and punctured, I was transferred to a cot and so began my
_first hospital night_. I was known personally to all the doctors in
our field-ambulance. I had on several occasions messed with them, and
they were always very keenly interested in my yarns of No Man's Land,
so when the news spread that I had been brought in wounded I soon had a
group round my bed, some of them in pyjamas being roused from their
sleep to hear the news. One of them very gleefully said: "Hullo,
Knyvett, old man--I've just won five pounds on you. We had a bet that
you would not last out another month. You know you've had a pretty
good innings and mighty lucky only to get wounded." But at that moment
I was not in the mood to appreciate this form of humor, until one of
them, seeing I was pretty uncomfortable, gave me an injection of
morphia. But I was very glad to be resting there and felt I could
hardly have endured a longer journey without a spell. I was given here
the first good hot meal I had had for weeks, though I had been given a
drink of steaming-hot coffee in the ambulance. There was not much
sleep to be got, as a constant stream of men were being brought in and
taken away, and now and again shells would fall quite close, but the
ground thereabouts was very soft, and I counted fifteen shells that
fell close by with a wouf and a squelch, but did not explode. This
hospital was all under canvas, just three or four big marquees and a
score or so of tents for the medical officers and orderlies, and any
inclination that I had to complain was taken away by the sight of
"walking cases" strolling in with an arm gone, or a hole in the cheek,
or their jaw smashed,