However, little by little they got used to me and I to them.  We became the best of friends and I never experienced more simple childlike gratitude than with these “Sidis.”  I remember one incident worth quoting.  I was suffering from a severe grippy cold—­they saw that I was tired and felt miserable.  I left the ward for a few moments.  On returning I found that they had pushed a bed a little to one side in a corner and had turned down the bed-clothes and placed a hot-water jug in it (without hot water).  The occupant was a Moroccan as black as the ace of spades; he was trepanned but was allowed up a certain number of hours a day.  “Maman,”—­they all called me Maman—­“toi blessee, toi ergut (lie down) nous tubibe (doctor) nous firmli (nurse).”  And this black, so-called savage, Moroccan took up his post beside the bed as I had often done for him.  I explained as best as I could that I would have to have a permission signed by the Medecin-Chef, otherwise I would be punished; and the Medecin-Chef had left the hospital for the night.  He shook his wise black head, “Maman blessee, Maman blessee!”

One called me one day and asked me what my Allah was like.  I told him I thought he was probably very much like his.  Well! if my Allah was not good to me, theirs would take care of me, they would see to that.

In May, 1916, I was asked to organize a war relief work[H] at the request of the Service de Sante.  This work was to provide the “grands blesses et malades” with light nourishing food, in other words, invalid food.  The rules and regulations of the French military hospitals are not sufficiently elastic to allow the administering of such food.  In time of war it would be easier almost to remove Mt.  Blanc than to change these rules and regulations.  There was just one solution—­private war relief work.

  [H] Le Bien—­Etre du Blesse.

So, with great regret, I bade good-bye to these children I never would have consented to have left had it not been for the fact that I knew from experience how necessary was the war relief work which was forced upon me, as I had seen many men die from want of light nourishing food.