As we explored further, the scene became more terrible; in the back rooms and in the upper building a number of severely wounded men had been placed, who began to howl as soon as we entered.  Many of them had been there for several days.  The brutality of circumstances, the relief of units, the enormous sum of work, all combined to create one of those situations which dislocate and overwhelm the most willing service.

We opened a door, and the men who were lying within began to scream at the top of their voices.  Some, lying on their stretchers on the floor, seized us by the legs as we passed, imploring us to attend to them.  A few bewildered orderlies hurried hither and thither, powerless to meet the needs of this mass of suffering.  Every moment I felt my coat seized, and heard a voice saying: 

“I have been here four days.  Dress my wounds, for God’s sake.”

And when I answered that I would come back again immediately, the poor fellow began to cry.

“They all say they will come back, but they never do.”

Occasionally a man in delirium talked to us incoherently as we moved along.  Sometimes we went round a quiet bed to see the face of the sufferer, and found only a corpse.

Each ward we inspected revealed the same distress, exhaled the same odour of antiseptics and excrements, for the orderlies could not always get to the patient in time, and many of the men relieved themselves apparently unconcerned.

I remember a little deserted room in disorder, on the table a bowl of coffee with bread floating in it; a woman’s slippers on the floor, and in a corner, toilet articles and some strands of fair hair. ...  I remember a corner where a wounded man suffering from meningitis, called out unceasingly:  27, 28, 29 ... 27, 28, 29 ... a prey to a strange obsession of numbers.  I see a kitchen where a soldier was plucking a white fowl ...  I see an Algerian non-commissioned officer pacing the corridor. ...

Towards noon, the head doctor arrived followed by my comrades, and our vehicles.  With him I made the round of the buildings again while they were unpacking our stores.  I had got hold of a syringe, while waiting for a knife, and I set to work distributing morphia.  The task before us seemed immense, and every minute it increased.  We began to divide it hastily, to assign to each his part.  The cries of the sufferers muffled the sound of a formidable cannonade.  An assistant at my side, whom I knew to be energetic and resolute, muttered between his teeth:  “No! no!  Anything rather than war!”

But we had first to introduce some order into our Inferno.

In a few hours this order appeared and reigned.  We were exhausted by days of marching and nights of broken sleep, but men put off their packs and set to work with a silent courage that seemed to exalt even the least generous natures.  Our first spell lasted for thirty-six hours, during which each one gave to the full measure of his powers, without a thought of self.