we had to wait till ten.
We kept water hot for sterilizing instruments. We sat around, reading,
thinking, chatting, letter-writing, waiting for something to happen.
There would be long days of waiting. There were days when there was no
shelling. Besides the wounded, we had visits from important
personages--the Mayor of Paris, the Queen of the Belgians, officers from
headquarters, Maxine Elliott. For a very special supper, we would jug a
Belgian hare or cook curry and rice, and add beer, jam, and black army
bread. An officer gave us an order for one hundred kilos of meat, and we
could send daily for it. On Christmas Day, 1914, for eight of us, we had
plum puddings, a bottle of port, a bottle of champagne, a tiny pheasant
and a small chicken, and a box of candies. We had a steady stream of
shells, and a few wounded. It was a day of sunshine on a light fall of
snow.

I learned in the Pervyse work that an up-to-date skirt is no good for a
man's work. With rain five days out of seven, rubber boots, breeches,
raincoat, two pairs of stockings, and three jerseys are the correct
costume. We were criticized for going to Dunkirk in breeches. So I put
on a skirt one time when I went there for supplies. I fell in alighting
from the motor-car, collecting a bigger crowd by sprawling than any of
us had collected by our uniform. Later, again in a skirt, I jumped on a
military motor-car, and couldn't climb the side. I had to pull my skirt
up, and climb over as a man climbs. If women are doing the work of a
man, they must have the dress of a man.

That way of dressing and of living released me from the sense of
possession, once and for all. When I first went to Belgium with a pair
of fleece-lined gloves, I was sure, if I ever lost that pair, that they
were irreplaceable. I lost them. I lost article after article, and was
freed from the clinging. I lost a pin for the bodice. I left my laundry
with a washerwoman. Her village was bombarded, and we had to move on. I
lost my kit. A woman has a tie-in with those material things, and the
new life brought freedom from that.

I put on a skirt to return to London for a rest. I found there people
dressed modishly, and it looked uncomfortable. Styles had been changing:
women were in funny shoes and hats. I went wondering that they could
dress like that.

And then an overpowering desire for pretty things came on me--for a
piece of old lace, a pink ribbon. After sleeping by night in the clothes
w