In the courtyard the flying column was getting ready to set out in search of other wounded men, not yet rescued from the firing line.  The officer in command was a young Belgian gentleman, Lieutenant de Broqueville, the son of the Belgian Prime Minister, and a man of knightly valour.  He was arranging the order of the day with Dr. Munro, who had organized the ambulance convoy, leading it through a series of amazing adventures and misadventures—­not yet to be written in history—­to this halting-place at Furnes.  Three ladies in field kit stood by their cars waiting for the day’s commands, and there were four stretcher-bearers, of whom I was the newest recruit.  Among them was an American journalist named Gleeson, who had put aside his pen for a while to do manual work in fields of agony, proving himself to be a man of calm and qifiet courage, always ready to take great risks in order to bring in a stricken soldier.  I came to know him as a good comrade, and in this page greet him again.

The story of the adventure which we went out to meet that day was written in the night that followed it, as I lay on straw with a candle by my side, and because it was written with the emotion of a great experience still thrilling in my brain and with its impressions undimmed by any later pictures of the war I will give it here again as it first appeared in the columns of the Daily Chronicle, suppressing only a name or two because those whom I wished to honour hated my publicity.

9

We set out before noon, winding our way through the streets of Furnes, which were still crowded with soldiers and wagons.  In the Town Hall square we passed through a mass of people who surrounded a body of 150 German prisoners who had just been brought in from the front.  It was a cheering sight for Belgians who had been so long in retreat before an overpowering enemy.  It was a sign that the tide of fortune was changing.  Presently we were out in open country, by the side of the Yser Canal.  It seemed very peaceful and quiet.  Even the guns were silent now, and the flat landscape, with its long, straight lines of poplars between the low-lying fields, had a spirit of tranquillity in the morning sunlight.  It seemed impossible to believe that only a few kilometres away great armies were ranged against each other in a death-struggle.  But only for a little while.  The spirit of war was forced upon our imagination by scenes upon the roadside.  A squadron of Belgian cavalry rode by on tired horses.  The men were dirty in the service of war, and haggard after long privations in the field.  Yet they looked hard and resolute, and saluted us with smiles as we passed.  Some of them shouted out a question:  “Anglais?” They seemed surprised and glad to see British ambulances on their way to the front.  Belgian infantrymen trudged with slung rifles along the roads of the villages through which we passed.  At one of our halts, while we waited for instructions from the Belgian headquarters, a group of these soldiers sat in the parlour of an inn singing a love-song in chorus.  One young officer swayed up and down in a rhythmic dance, waving his cigarette.  He had been wounded in the arm, and knew the horror of the trenches; but for a little while he forgot, and was very gay because he was alive.