Kate John Finzi

“ It will not be hard to sift the wheat from the chaff, the seekers after sensation from the genuine workers. For there is no romance in the work of a hospital, no jaunts to battlefields bearing cups of water to the dying, no soothing of pillows and holding the hands of patients; but ten to twelve hours each day occupied in the accomplishment of tasks so menial that one would hesitate to ask a servant to perform them. ”

“ In the kitchen, where daily we are gleaning undreamt-of wisdom on the scores of ration-drawing, diet sheets, order forms, chaos would reign but for the continual presence of one of us. For the two French girls and two orderlies are tumbling over each other in their anxiety to get things done up to time. As it is, things work admirably, and we are all growing adepts at brandishing heavy meat choppers and cooking in the cauldrons and stewpots, so large that no two women can move them. ”

“ No one who has not heard that appeal direct from dying lips (for dying men don't lie) can know how great is the longing to tell about it at home—to let the slackers know that for each shell not forthcoming ten valuable lives are lost, ten homes needlessly bereaved. It is intolerably unjust that the man who refuses to do his duty out here is promptly shot, whilst the man who strikes at home is merely bribed with offers of higher wages.
After all, it is a war not only of men, but of arms and ammunition, and it lies in the hands of those at home as much as those out here to see the thing through. ”

“ No wonder Boulogne is full to overflowing. No wonder the little out-of-the-way cafés have taken on something of the glamour and éclat of Rumpelmayer or the Ritz. No wonder everyone who can afford to be is in France. One feels it in the air, it is the Real Thing; one is no longer a looker-on, but a moving factor of things who can afford to pity those at home whose activities have not yet had occasion to be called into play. ”

“ We are all fatalists now, like the men in the trenches.
Nor is the passing of so many familiar faces altogether a pleasing thing to contemplate, whilst the psychology of new arrivals leaves us marvelling. Did we ever thrill at the sight of a crowded camp, a convoy, or feel an odd sensation of pride at the sight of the khaki-crammed rooms in the early days of our apprenticeship? Were we inspired to write long descriptions of "The Front"—as they insist on calling the Base—and of War?
Every now and then one feels tempted to say, "War? What do you know of war? ”

“ All the afternoon we worked hard at concerts in the hospital and soldiers' institute, where I acted as accompanist. No doubt one day we shall grow accustomed to war, but I own that the crowded wards of the vast barn of men (whose hearty applause and cheery choruses covered the deficiencies of the performance) , the uniforms, the white caps, the cheerfulness born of the determination to make the best of the abnormal circumstances, struck me as a never-to-be-forgotten thing. ”

“ There are hours when one would love a little solitude—the solitude that is, [Pg 138] after all, as necessary for well-being as food and rest; hours when the time to digest and sift the manifold occurrences of the day, the presence of a congenial friend to replace the many acquaintances with whom circumstances have herded us together, and a browse over a favourite poet, would be very welcome. Yet, in truth, poetry no longer matters, art no longer matters, music no longer matters to most of us; nothing really matters save life and death and the end of this carnage. ”

“ A military cemetery "Somewhere in France" is a thing one does not forget. If, one day when peace reigns, we are once more growing slothful and negligent of the bigger issues of life, let us pay a yearly pilgrimage to one of these shrines of our honoured exiles.
True, the French gravediggers will no longer be shovelling the sandy soil over the newest comers, hiding the tier upon tier of plain deal coffins or the number-plates that are the only distinguishing marks; true, the unwonted odour of Death will no longer haunt our nostrils ”

“ The five days' "furlough" have passed as a dream, and it was with a sigh of infinite relief that I stepped once more on to French soil.
The extraordinary "let's-muddle-along-it-can't-last-for-ever" attitude at home is distinctly depressing, and the fact that half of the people are quite content to let others do their job whilst they look on with an amused smile and reap the benefit of the shortage of men makes one long to see them well "strafed." ”

“ To the left the bridge, through the arches of which is a glimpse of landscape as peaceful as any Tuscan village, and over which the trains pass intermittently up to the front by day and by night. They rush past with a whistle that is more of a shriek and a groan, as if they themselves realised the value of their burden—the guns, the ammunition wagons, the trainloads of men in khaki or in blue clustered along the edge of the overcrowded trucks designed to carry "eighteen horses or thirty-six men." ”

“ Ambulance after ambulance passed, a few going fast, most, alas! at the slow, cautious speed that betokens the worst.
What untold misery these crushed bits of humanity mean, borne swiftly to the silent city of suffering! How gladly we would suffer for them! Yet not a moan, not a groan, in those great wards whilst mind and will have power to cope with the agonies of the flesh. ”

“ When the great history of this almost untellable War comes to be told, historians will find themselves faced with a collection of evidence so devious, so at variance, that their task will be well-nigh stupendous. Whether, when they come to sift their data, they will have time to cast more than a passing glance at the great military bases that sprung up in an allied country, where once an invading army had stood, remains to be seen. That these bases, and in especial the largest and nearest to the firing line, Boulogne, have played a large rôle in the scheme of things cannot be denied. ”

“ There is no denying that what the Red Cross lacks in organisation it makes up for in generosity, as many a patient could tell, many a hospital testify; and, all things considered, is it in any way less well organised than other institutions in this chaotic zone, in these chaotic times, where only the unforeseen seems to occur, and where the duplication of authority is so bewildering that it is almost an impossibility to lay one's finger on the man responsible for any particular department? ”

“ London is almost as Belgian as Boulogne is anglicised. Rotund Belgians sit knitting in the stalls, their sombre day dresses contrasting strangely with our erstwhile brilliant audiences.
"Evening dress optional but unfashionable," as one theatre announces.
A joy for ever is the element of free-and-easy good-humour brought over by our Colonials. If the last ten months have done no other good, they have at least knit together, in bonds that can never be riven, our wonderful Empire. ”

“ There is the little wizened bit of humanity who gazes all day long into space with a horror-stricken look, or falls asleep, half on the floor, half on the bed, until aroused. The unearthly green pallor of his face is not accounted for by his slum upbringing alone, but by the German gas and the fact that he has twice been blown heavenwards by exploding mines. There is the finely built Canadian—one of the first contingent who have all "seen hell with the lid off," to use their own terminology—who, when the pain of his rheumatic limbs allows, is so very precise in his toilet. ”

“ Chief and foremost of these, needless to say, would be an unlimited supply of those hot baths we were wont to accept as our birthright, and are only just beginning to value at their true worth. I wonder if anyone who has not spent a bleak winter in the jerry-built summer residences of a French watering-place, whose eyes have not been continually offended by the salmon-pink walls and hideous rococo cupids on low ceilings, can realise the true joy of living once more in a house, no matter how modest, but a house built to withstand the weather? ”

“ Yes, as to the sound of the soft-toned grand we sat by the fire enjoying the ever sweet smell of burning logs, whilst, with the inscrutable smile of one to whom the mysteries of Life and Death are revealed, the death mask of the woman who was found in the Seine looked down from her oak beam, and the hour-glass speeded its atoms along the road to eternity, for the first time France and work seemed anything but attractive. ”

“ Just the steady, dullish daily duties of caring for and tending an ever-changing stream of weary women! Yet what work can have more far-reaching influence on the wounded and sick than the fact that the nursing sisters are strong and fit to cope with their strenuous work?
Here, in the far-away forest of Hardelot, in the beautiful yet simple house lent by the Duke of Argyll, that, with its distempered white walls, old oak furniture and bright chintzes, seems a veritable bit of England, the Red Cross have opened a home where worn-out nurses may rest and recuperate. ”

“ It is an odd coincidence that the last words of this War Diary should be penned by candlelight in a darkened northern town, to the sound of bombs falling on an entirely defenceless city. With the truly sporting instinct of Britons, everyone has turned out to see what they may of the "fuss" by which our humane foe hopes to terrorise us. By the light of flares the great marauding machines of destruction are seen to hover apparently stationary. ”

“ One would not want those at home to know all there is to know of modern warfare—of the vast pestilential graveyard that is Belgium—yet one cannot help wishing that some of the vibrations of these strenuous times could be more clearly felt by them, that they would cease to see things as they wish to see them, and realise that the worst is yet to come—that we must brace ourselves to face it. ”

“ Each New Year's Day one wonders afresh at the oddness of commencing the year in January, cold January, when all the world is engrossed in recovering from Christmas benevolence and bracing itself to hustle through the days with the minimum amount of cold, instead of Nature's New Year in April. January, this month of surprises, with its rain and sunshine, sleet and mists, its promises of rest soon to be found, is surely already a hoary old man with a life of infinite experience behind him, a month for achieving and not for beginning things. ”

“ Within the hangar lay all the trappings and trunks of those huge inflated monsters, whose levers regulate such wonderfully diverse bombs of destruction, and whose observer's seat might be a smoking-room arm-chair for comfort. From a corner, where lay the debris of derelict machines, we were allowed to purloin a small piece of the yellow fabric as a memento of our visit, whilst over the tea-table—for the quality of which there were many quite unneedful apologies—we came across the air jargon, of which hitherto only "dope" and "cold feet" had figured in our vocabulary. ”

“ A dismal rain has set in, which brings to mind the words of the secretary at the Rouen Consulate: "When winter sets in the fighting must temporarily cease. I know every inch of Belgium; know, too, that no attack can be made on country so sodden that every wheel sinks at least a yard into the ground. Believe me, what the Germans have they will hold—at least this winter. For Belgium will be impregnable!" ”

“ Even those who are worst hit, who have lost their nearest and dearest, are so engrossed in their little charities, their bandage-making and knitting and Red Cross lectures, that they have little leisure to mope. London is as gay or gayer than ever, not a bit purged, for every man home on leave is busy making the best of time. How different from the Frenchman, whose one idea on getting out of the trenches is to set his house in order, to instruct the women who are doing his work how to manipulate the latest agricultural implements, to help prepare for the harvest! ”

“ Until one has felt the clinging of the helpless hand, or run to the call of a feeble voice, one does not know the greatest of all joys—the joy of service.
The rapidity with which the Gare Maritime Hospital is developing is marvellous. Instead of wallowing to our ankles in a slush of disinfectant and rain-water, the wards are well swept, with two strips of cheery red carpet on either side. Instead of boards and blankets, some 200 real beds have been installed, with sheets of coarse calico and pillows. ”