Pinetown, Natal,
June 1900.

We have had a stiff time of work since I wrote last. I think I told you that several orderlies were ill, when our first cases came in, with dengue fever, and soon the medical officers began knocking up with it—first one and then another; next, the sisters took it; no one has been very ill, but the fever was high for several days, and, of course, they were weak and seedy after it went down; so we have not had a full staff at work for some time, and with lots of bad cases in the wards it has made things very difficult.

Several odd cases have been straying in, and on the 17th we took in five officers, and then on the 19th of last month we admitted eight officers and thirty men from Modder Spruit, most of them very ill, and one poor fellow so bad with hÆmorrhage (enteric) that he died the same night.

We had to open a second officers' ward, and the sister put in charge was very hopeless (at having so many bad cases, and such inefficient help); so I had to spend a good deal of time helping her look after the worst cases, and then the next morning after they arrived I found she had dengue fever and could not come on duty; so I had to take charge of her ward for a few days, and do the best I could in looking after the patients with the help of the orderlies, amidst constant interruptions and appeals for help or advice from different parts of the camp.

With every one so new to the work—the cook quite unused to military ways or the serving of hospital diets, the storekeeper hardly knowing where anything is, or whether he ought to issue it when he did know, ten Kaffir women washing who could not read the marks on the linen, and so were quite incapable of returning it to the right place without my assistance, and, to do the house work, several new Kaffir boys who really are quite "raw" and want constant looking after (they rejoice in the names of John, Monday, Charlie, and Cup-of-tea; they can speak about six words of English between them, and it is awfully funny hearing the orderlies trying to make them understand), with much other work needing to be done in connection with fitting up new wards and preparing for our opening day ceremony—you can imagine it was difficult to be tied up in one ward with a lot of sick officers who required one's best attention, and more; but it had to be done, and I had to leave the rest to do the best they could, only going round to attend to the most necessary things when I could spare half-an-hour in the day, and after the night sister came on at night.

My worst case was poor Captain ——, of the —— Dragoons, who was desperately bad from the day he came in, and was delirious most of the time; Lieutenant ——, of the same regiment (a friend of his), was very good in sitting with him for part of the day, and when he was at his worst one of the other sisters and I took turns of acting night special (as the night sister could not possibly stay with him much); but he had been thoroughly worn out with the hardships of the campaign before he got the fever, and though he lingered on so that we kept hoping he would pull through, he died on the 30th of May—our first death amongst the officers, and we all felt very sad. It was terrible for Lieutenant —— (ill with rheumatism), as he knows the captain's relations, and has been cabling to them daily. The funeral was the next day, and the station-master kindly stopped a goods train here, so that the few officer patients who were well enough might go to Pinetown to attend, and all the medical officers who could leave also went. I was too busy to go, but I helped Lieutenant —— to make a cross of white flowers to put on the coffin.

A thing that always makes me feel creepy when I am working in the store is the sight, in one corner, of a little pile of coffins that have been sent up from Durban; of course it is really necessary to keep them ready as, in this climate, the funeral must be the day following the death, but we have had them covered up now, as I did not like the men to see them when they went up to the store for things.

All that last batch of men were frightfully poisoned with enteric, and nothing seemed to stop it; six of them have died, and most of them had symptoms of blood poisoning too.

I don't think I told you that the two sisters who went to help on one of the hospital ships till we could get rooms ready for them, came up at the beginning of May. They brought a poor account of the nursing on that particular ship, and said that, when they went away, there was no fully-trained nurse left on board; that a large proportion of the men who had been ill any length of time, had sore backs (some before they reached the ship). It seems sad that when there are so many fully-trained nurses in England longing to come out, these poor fellows should not be getting the best nursing they might have, even right down at the base.

On the 21st of May we heard that Mafeking was really relieved, and on the 25th of May we were officially "opened." General Wolfe Murray was to have performed the ceremony, but he could not come, as General Buller had sent for him, so the Bishop of Natal and Colonel Morris did it between them.

There were special trains from Maritzburg and Durban; a good many people to lunch, and such a crowd in the afternoon—no one seems to know how many, but I think we gave tea to about five hundred. Fortunately, Sister —— was on duty again, so I was not fixed up in her ward, but she was still needing help with her bad cases. I made the teabags in the middle of the night while I took my turn at sitting by poor Captain ——, and several people who live near here were very kind in helping me arrange flowers on the day, and they cut up cake for me. We had a lot of coolie waiters up from Durban, and our house-boys and some whom Mrs. T. (a most kindly neighbour) sent to help, were washing up all the afternoon.

I can't say I enjoyed the day, as we had several patients very ill, and two poor fellows died that day, but we managed to keep their ward (and one of the officers' wards) closed to visitors, so they were not disturbed, and everything went smoothly and well.

When the visitors were leaving, I asked the Major if the orderlies might come and finish up the cakes, &c., as there was some good tea in the urns still, and they had all been working very well, so he told the sergeant-major they might. I was rather amused at one thing: I took a big tin and gave it to the sergeant-major, asking him to save a few cakes for the night orderlies, but he pointed out to me they were all present; the news of a tea and some good "skoff" had brought them all down from their tents, and they soon made short work of the remains.

I went into Durban one day to do some necessary shopping, and on the train met Colonel Galway, the P.M.O., going down to inspect the hospital ships. He was very nice to me, and told me that if I liked to engage any more sisters out here I might do so, and he would take them on; so I am engaging a lady as a kind of probationer and housekeeper. Her husband is at the front, and she wants to help, and I think she will be able to relieve me a good deal by looking after the house-boys, putting out linen, &c.

Our sisters are working awfully well, but some of them don't get on well with the orderlies—a great mistake: they don't seem able to hide the fact that they think the orderlies very useless and incapable, and consequently the orderlies don't do their best in working with them; it is a great pity, as the men are quite willing and anxious to learn, and are very patient in having to do many jobs that must be very trying to them.

At last I have got a nice white woman to look after the Kaffir washing ladies, and she will do the starching, &c., for the staff. Two of the Kaffirs were washing all day with babies tied on their backs—such jolly fat and shiny little black-a-moors. I gave them an empty packing-case with some sawdust in it and a mat, and both the babies and mothers were delighted.

I actually had a ride the other day; Mrs. D. kindly lent me a horse, and I rode with the Major over to a most interesting Trappist monastery. The Trappist Fathers cultivate a lot of land, and teach the native boys various trades. They are going to supply us with eggs, vegetables, &c., and the Major arranged with them that they should visit our Roman Catholic patients, and, if any of them die, they will bury them in their churchyard.

We shall have to have a horse for funeral purposes, and we have been offered a rather nice-looking black animal, so I hope that, to my varied duties, will be added that of keeping the funeral horse exercised!

I don't care much for walking about here, there is so much long grass, and you get covered with ticks (to say nothing of one's natural fear of snakes), so an occasional hour or two on horseback will be refreshing, though up to now I have hardly left the camp except to go to church at Pinetown once on Sundays.

I had a letter the other day from the Secretary of the Durban Ladies' Club to say they had made us all honorary members—a very kind and friendly attention on their part. It is a nice club, but whether we shall ever have time to make use of it remains to be proved.

There are many strange animals about here: a huge owl is getting quite tame, and comes to be fed by the night sister.

The men are trying to shoot a wild cat, but can't get up near to it. After hearing them talking about it, I was rather frightened the other night (sleeping with my door and window open), when something jumped from the window on to my bed; I felt it creeping towards me, and was just going to dive under the bedclothes when it began to purr, and I found it was the camp kitten!