Often and often I am asked, “Why didn’t you die when you were lying out there on the battle-field?” Why didn’t I die?  I could have, several times, but I didn’t want to die, and I knew that if I were found I need not die.  We raw soldiers when we go to France are interested in the possibilities of being wounded.  We know we’ve more or less got it coming to us, and we begin quietly to make inquiries.  We notice all those men who wear the gold honor-bars on their sleeves.  Yes; for every wound we get we have the right to wear a narrow strip of gold braid on the tunic sleeve.

We talk to the man with the honor-bar.  We ask him how he was treated in the hospital.  He may be doing the dirtiest fatigue duty round trench or camp, he may be smoking or writing a letter, but the minute be hears the word “hospital” he drops everything.  If he be a Cockney soldier he will repeat the word:  “‘Orspital, mate—­lor’ luv ye, wish I wuz back!”

That is the feeling.  Talk to a thousand men after this war; ask them their experiences and they will tell you a thousand different stories.  Ask them how they were treated in the hospital and there is but one reply:  “Treated in hospital?  Excellent!”

There is only one word.  The great Red Cross—­Royal Army Medical Corps—­is practically one hundred per cent. efficient.  The veterans will tell the youngsters, “If you’re wounded and have to lie out—­then, lie out—­don’t be foolish enough to die while you are lying out—­because you can’t die once they find you.”

YOU CAN’T DIE.

We remember that.  We remember facts, too, that we hear from time to time.  We remember that out of all the casualties on the western front, only two and a half per cent. have died of wounds.  We remember that we have a ninety-seven and a half fighting chance out of a hundred, and we are willing to take it.  Some of us have read of other wars and we know, for instance, that in the American Civil War, from the best available statistics, over twenty-two per cent. died of wounds—­and the reason?  No efficient medical corps—­no Red Cross—­no neutral flag of red on white.

I was taken over to London as soon as I could be moved.  I was in the Royal Herbert Hospital at Woolwich.  It is not possible to describe in detail the treatment.  The doctors were untiring.  Hour after hour and day after day they worked without ceasing.  The nurses were unremitting.  No eight-hour day for them!

And here again I saw the treatment of the German wounded.  They were in wards as gay with flowers, as cool, as clean, as delightful as ours.  They had German newspapers to read, and certain days of the week brought a German band, drawn from among fit prisoners, to play German airs for the benefit of the sick prisoners.  We think of this, and then we meet a British or French soldier who has been exchanged or who has escaped from a German hospital prison!  It is hard to think of it calmly.  The first impulse is to follow the law, “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.”  But that is not the way to-day of the square fighter.