The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1917-04-21
SPRING DAYS IN A PARIS HOS.
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Hanford Henderson in North Ameri-
can Review: When the wounds are
dressed, as they must be, every day
l have seen scores of men stuff towels
into their own mouths, so that they
may not groan aloud. 1t is hard to
endure the groals OF men in anguish
OF strong men who faced death in
trenches and on battlefelds. Gener-
ally 1t is a heartrending wail-some-
times a repeated. monosyIlable whose
very cadence pierces the very heart
occasionally 1t il articulate: Mon
Dieu, Monsieur lie Docteur, have pity
have pity!" And the odor Of wounded
flesh is q terrible thing. / waken in
the night and smell II. / smell it as
write. 1t will be months before
can get 1t out of my nostrils.
The men who best endure suffering
are the Breton folk, for the Bretons
are mystics. and more conscious than
ordinary people OF the immediate
presence of God. AS an old French
monk once put 1t, they have the prac-
ton boy here who has lost one arm and
both legs, and as passed his bed the
other day he smiled at me so divinely
that the old physician, who was max
ing his rounds. said to me twice, u
love that boy. ] love that boy"
Hideous, atrocious, criminal as the
present war is, it has re-emphasized
one fact of large consoling power-the
eternal supremacy Of the Spirit. And
this is the reason that France. hard
pressed as she may be at times, will
never be beaten. She has the power OF
the Spirit.
To work in a hospital in wartime
one must have oneself well in hand
emotionally. or one could not do the
work. The first few days | was gasp
ing. Now I have gained the needed
discipline. But 1t ss curious that one
can 60 along rather stolidly for days,
and then quite suddenly. without a
moments warning, something gives
way inside. the eyes fill with tears.
and for the sake Of appearance, one
turns a sob into the pretense Of a
cough. It is not the big things that
unman you so. not the groans Of men
in anguish as their wounds are being
dressed. or the faraway look in the
eyes OF those who you know are 60
ing to die. It il the little things that
are SO melting, often q mere smile,
often some droll awkwardness on the
part of the mutiles. Last Sunday, 1t
was a smile. He was a newly ar
rived bIesse-he had come in during
the night-one of my favorite cultiva-
EGuESs, 1lG was OA1Ay 80 anu ~ WdS bilC
fifth time that he had been wounded.
Il must hav been very painful, for he
had FIVE or six separate wounds, in
arm and leg and hand and thigh-all
from one shell burst. Had he WINGED
or complained could doubtless have
taken my notes stolidiy enough. But
ne did neither. He told me the story
Of his wounds with unaffected simplic-
ity, and with O. smile so radiant, so
brilliant, that always / shall think Of
him. not as a fallen hero, but as a
glorious figure Of victory-for the
lying down.
The haunting tragedy here is not
ieath--it is the hideous, multiform,
disabling mutilations. the loss OF vi
sion, or hearing. of speech. the loss of
hands and feet and arms and legs, the
monstrous repulsive Disagreement. In
summer, on my own plantation, my
little boys play in the open sunshine
In all the happy freedom of entire
and / know OF nothing
more beautiful than the naked. sun
tanned bodies Of healthy boys. But the
naked bodies Of multilated men, such
as we see here every day by the hum
bred, are simply CHASTITY. a more grip
ping argument against the brutal url-
IorgivabIe cruelty Of war than any
amount OF academic reasoning. And
each days adds les gruesome toll.
When the war ends. there will be 49,
900, 900 cripples In Europe.