The French, meantime, had three sorts of hospitals,—­the Divisional ones coming between the Regimental and the General.  Only the very slightest cases ever enter their Regimental Hospital; those which may last weeks are referred to the Divisional; and those which may last months, with prospect of recovery, to the General Hospital.  The Sardinian plan was nearly the same.  The Russians had Divisional Hospitals at various stations; and all cases were carried to them.

The Regimental Hospitals are wherever the regiments are.  The advantage is, that aid can be immediately rendered,—­not only in case of wounds, but of cholera, in which it is desirable to lay a patient down in the nearest bed to which he can be conveyed.  The disadvantages are the hap-hazard quality of the site, the absence of quiet and seclusion, and the liability of being near the scene of conflict.  These things cause the French to prefer the Divisional Hospital, which, while still within reach, is set farther back from the force, in a picked situation, and managed on a large scale and with nicer exactitude.

The General Hospital is understood to be at the base of operations:  and this supposes, as a part of its organization, a system of transport, not only good of its kind, but adequate to any demands consequent on a great battle, or the spread of an epidemic in the camp.  The nearer the hospital is to the active force, the better, of course; but there are conditions to be fulfilled first.  It must be safe from the enemy.  It must be placed in a permanent station.  It must be on a good road, and within immediate reach of markets.  It ought also to be on the way home, for the sake of the incurable or the incapacitated who must be sent home.

In the Regimental Hospital, the surgeon may be seen going from the man who has lost a finger to a fever patient,—­and then to one who has ophthalmia,—­passing on to a fellow raving in delirium tremens,—­next to whom is a sufferer under bronchitis, who will not be allowed to go out of doors for weeks to come; and if half a dozen are brought in with cholera in the course of the day, the officials do not know which way to turn.  It is possible that the surgeon may be found making starch over the kitchen fire, because there is nobody at hand who understands how to make starched bandages; or he may be at the desk, casting up columns of figures, or writing returns, when he is urgently wanted at the bedside.  Such things can hardly happen now; but they have happened within ten years.  The Russians, meantime, would be carrying all manner of patients to one of their hospital-stations,—­each sufferer to the hospital of his own division.  The French would leave the men with scratches and slight diarrhea and delirium tremens in the Regimental Hospital,—­would send the fever and bronchitis and scorbutic patients to the Divisional,—­and any gravely wounded, or rheumatic, or other very long cases to the General Hospital at the base of operations.