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98 WITH THE GERMAN ARMIES IN THE WEST
A batch of French prisoners adds to the congestion. I speak
to the one who is nearest. He says that out of his company
only twenty-six men were in a position to use their arms when
he was taken prisoner, that so many officers had been killed
that there was hardly anybody left to command.
As we are halting by the side of our ditch, we have an
opportunity of witnessing the distribution of forage by a
supply column. A large fatigue party come dragging huge
trusses of hay. Here is another troop of slightly wounded
who are proceeding in charge of a medical service N.C.O.
from a Leichtverwundeten-Sammelplatz, or collecting station
for slightly wounded, to the nearest base. We are asked if we
have room for two more men. " Yes, if you can stand
on the foot-board." Yes, they were quite agreeable, and at
last we get under way with our new burden. Here and there
a horse has fallen during the day and lies cold and stiff by the
roadside. A mortar ammunition column is proceeding in our
direction. It is empty. The division stationed at Eclis-
fontaine has its supply for to-morrow’s fighting already on
the spot.
Now we are at Romagne and here we get badly stuck.
There is a frightful crush in the village street. It is no use
trying to force our way. We stop just in front of an emergency
field hospital. The head surgeon is standing in the street
and issuing his orders for the treatment and distribution of
the newly arrived wounded. I am introduced to him and he
declines to let me go until I have seen his organisation at work.
To come to the front to study the war and not to see the field
hospital at Romagne !
" No, thank you, my dear Doctor,
that will never do ! You have spent the day watching the
wounded come back from the fighting line after their first
temporary field dressing. You have seen the principal dressing
station at Eclisfontaine. Now you must absolutely stop for
a look at the third hospital establishment, our field hospital,
where all the wounded have to pass."
Thus speaking the Herr Stabsarzt conducts me into the
beautiful and ancient little Catholic church. I seem to step
into the Middle Ages as I enter this temple, where a hundred
years ago Napoleon’s victories had been proclaimed to re-
joicing congregations. The sun is setting and twilight is
descending over France. It is dusk inside, but still light
enough to distinguish the precious stained-glass windows.
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