The Yale expositor., 1918-08-08
CHAPTER v.-continued.

One man-and l think he was the
smallest eater in the camp-won it on
three successive days, but it was well
for him that his luck deserted him on
the fourth day, for he probably would
have been handled rather roughly by
the rest of the crowd, who were grow
ing suspicious. But we handled the
drawing ourselves and knew there was
nothing crooked about it, so he was
spared.
We were allowed to buy pears, and
being small and very hard, they were
used as the stakes in many a game.
But the interest in these little games
piles of money instead of two or three
half-starved pears. No man was ever
so reckless, however, in all the betting
as to wager his own ratiOns.
BY the most scheming and sacrific-
ing j ever did in my life / managed 10
hoard two pieces of bread (grudgingly
spared at the time from my daily ra-
tions), but i was preparing for the day
when l she uld escape-if ever should.
1t was MT a sacrifice easily made
either, but instead of eating bread
ate pears antil finally got one piece
of bread ahead; and when ! could
force myself to stick to the pear diet
again, / saved the other piece from
that days allowance, and in days to
for the foresight.
Whenever a new prisoner came In
and his German hosts had satisfied
themselves as to his life history and
taken down all the details-that is all
he would give them-he was immedi-
ately surrounded by his fellow prison
ers, who were eager for any bit of
news or information he could possibly
give them, and as rule he was glad
to tell us, because, if he had been in
the hands of the Huns for any length
of time, he had seen very few English
officers.
The conditions of this prison were
bad enough when man was in nor
mally good health, but it was barbar-
Gus to subject a wounded soldier TO
the hardships and discomforts of the
place. However, this was the fate of
poor private we discovered there one
day in terrific pain, suffering from
shrapnel in his stomach and back. All
of us officers asked to have him sent
to a hospital, but the doctors CURLY
refused, saying ii was against orders
So the poor creature went on suffering
from day to day and was still there
when | left-anOther victim of Ger.
man cruelty.
At one time in this prison camp there
were French marine, French flying
officer, two Belgian soldiers, and of the
United Kingdom one from Canada, two
from England, three from Ireland, q
couple from Scotland, one from Wales
man from South Africa, one from
Algeria, and New Zealander the
latter being from my own squadron, Q
man whom l thought had been killed
and he was equally surprised wher
brought into the prison TO find me
there. In addition there were a Chi
naman and myself from the U. S. A.
1t was quite a cosmopolitan group
and as one typical Irishman said
"Sure. and we have every nation that's
worth mentioning including the darr
Germans with us whites" OF course
this was not translated 10 the Ger
mans, nor was it even spoken in theil
hearing, or we probably would no
nave had quite so cosmopolitan bunch
Each man in the prison was ready Il
uphold his native country in any argu
ment that could possibly be started
and it goes without saying that never
took back seat i'm any of them will
my praise for America, with the Cana
dian and Chlnaman Ginning in on m!
side. But they were friendly argu
ments; we were all in the same boa
and that was no place for quarreilng
Every other morning, the weathe
allowing we were taken to a larg,
swimming pool and were allowed Il
have bath. There were two pools
one for the German officers and on,
for the men. Although we were Off
GERS, we had to use the pool occupie,
by the men. While we were I'M swim
ming a German guard with a riff
across his knees sat at each corner @
the pool and watched us closely n
we dressed and undressed. Englis
interpreters accompanied us on all G
these trips, so at no time could W
talk without their knowing what wa
going on.
Whenever we were taken out of III
prison for any purpose they AWAY
raraded us through the most crowde
ifreets-evidently TO give the pop'
A. i, bat they were ge'tin