  In 1915 there were 6,400 hospitals in France and 18,000 doctors. During large offensives the wounded arrived in Paris at the rate of thirty trainloads per day. In Lyons at one time there were 15,000 wounded men. At Verdun 28,000 wounded men were treated in one hospital during a 25 day period. In the spring of 1918, 40 per cent of the entire French Army had been killed, captured or hopelessly mutilated. Of the 60 per cent remaining at that time there were 1,500,000 wounded and crippled men in the hospitals of France. With the exception, as far as known, of the American Hospital at Nice and the Scottish Woman’s Hospital at Royemont, both of which maintain themselves, the pay for care and attendance of each patient which comes from the French Government is limited to one franc, 25 centimes per day (22½ cents). The balance is made up by the Red Cross, individuals and communities, according SERBIAN MEDAL Hospitals are of two classes. They are in or out of the army zone. The Army Zone is a piece of land under strict military law, extending, possibly, twenty miles back from the trenches. Ordinarily, weekly Red Cross trains carry the evacuated wounded, or disabled, soldiers from the Army Zone to the interior. During a general engagement trains wait, are filled with wounded from ambulances, and sent away immediately as soon as filled. A limited number of these decorations were presented by S. A. R., the Prince Regent of Serbia, to President PoincarÉ of the French Republic, for distribution to officers and men for distinguished and brilliant conduct under fire. Two were allotted the 163rd Regiment of the Line—one for an officer, the other to a private.] The hospital in the Army Zone, necessary for military reasons, is not looked upon with favor by the common soldier. It is too military. He has his If he must have a nurse, he does not want a limping, growling, medically unfit man. He prefers placing his suffering-racked body, injured by the hand of hate, where it can be nursed back to health with kindly ministering love. The sick soldier does not want to be pestered or bothered. He prefers to be left alone. He does not wish a nosing uplifter to come and tell him what he shall do, and what he shall not do. He had enough orders in the army. Because he wears a uniform, he is none the less a man. He may not be rich. But riches are no passport to heaven. He has only contempt for lively humbugs, who ape superiority, and try to push something down his throat which he does not want. In the Army Zone hospital, supposed to be sick, he is not allowed outside except under certain conditions, and then in charge of a nurse. When convalescent, he is quarantined in the In the hospitals of the interior, he gets much more liberal treatment. If able, he may wander about, without a chaperon, in the afternoons. He will buy a red herring and walk up the middle of the street eating it. Four men go into a shop, buy five cents worth of cheese, and each pays for his own wine. Store windows have an irresistible attraction for him. Post cards hold his gaze for hours. A whistling small boy brings him to a full stop. He has not heard such a happy sound for a long time. He blesses the little fellow for showing so much cheer in the midst of suffering. After several days, he notices people stare at him a good deal. Yes, he limps too much. Every step brings pain. He senses their kindly sympathy but, somehow or other, resents it. So, he goes out into the country, where, while he rests in the lap of Nature, the warm sun helps the doctors coax the poison from the wound, rheumatism from the joints, and shock from the system. I shall not forget the many little courtesies received in the French hospitals at Saumur, Montreuil-Ballay, Remiremont, Pont de Veyle and Bourg. Suffering unites the sympathetic. Pain is the barometer that tests the human fiber. The soldier, who has been through the fire with his fellows, who has been wounded, as they were, who suffered, as they did, has an established comradeship that endures. He was interested in them and they in him. When he is low and the day ahead looks dark and dreary, he can feel their sympathy. Probably no word is spoken, but he knows the whole ward is pulling for him. He does not want to disappoint his friends. He rises to the occasion. That sympathy means the difference between life and death. The faithful, never-tiring nurses patiently remain at their posts, color washed from their cheeks, hands worn, seamed by labor, dark eyes, flashing like stars of a wintry night, unceasingly, they work to bring back to health those who almost died for them. In their sweet, white uniforms, suppressing their own troubles with a jolly smile, they greet and welcome the mud-stained, lousy, dirty poilu and give him an affectionate word—far more efficient, a much better tonic, than medicine. |
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