Dear Major R. and Mr. ---- (whom I never met before), unless they read this Journal, which isn't likely, they will never know how my heart warmed towards them, nor how happy I count myself in being allowed to see them. They showed me how good it is to be alive; how excellent, above all things, to be a man and to be young for ever, and to go out into the most gigantic war in history, sitting in an armoured car which is as a rabbit-hutch for safety, and to have been a pacifist, that is to say a sinner, like Mr. ----, so that on the top of it you feel the whole glamour and glory of conversion. Others may have known the agony and the fear and sordid filth and horror and the waste, but they know nothing but the clean and fiery passion and the contagious ecstasy of war. If you were to tell Mr. ---- about the mystic fascination of the south-east road, the road that leads eventually to Waterloo, he would most certainly understand you, but it is very doubtful whether he would let you venture very far down it. Whereas the Commandant, sooner or later, will. [_Thursday, 8th._] Had breakfast with Mr. L. Went down to the "Flandria." They say Zele has been taken. There has been terrific anxiety here for Ursula Dearmer and the two Belgian nurses (Madame F.'s daughter and niece), who were left there all night in the convent, which may very well be in the hands of the Germans by now. An Ambulance car went off very early this morning to their rescue and has brought them back safe. We are told that the Germans are really advancing on Ghent. We have orders to prepare to leave it at a minute's notice. This time it looks as if there might be something in it. I attend to the Commandant's correspondence. Wired Mr. Hastings. Wired Miss F. definitely accepting the Field Ambulance Corps and nurses she has raised in Glasgow. Her idea is that her Ambulance should be an independent unit attached to our corps but bearing her name. (Seems rather a pity to bring the poor lady out just now when things are beginning to be risky and our habitations uncertain.) The British troops are pouring into Ghent. There is a whole crowd of them in the _Place_ in front of the Station. And some British wounded from Antwerp are in our Hospital. Heavy fighting at Lokeren, between Ghent and Saint Nicolas. Car 1 has been sent there with the Commandant, Ursula Dearmer, Janet McNeil and the Chaplain (Mr. Foster has been hurt in lifting a stretcher; he is out of it, poor man). Mrs. Torrence, Dr. Wilson and Mr. Riley have been sent to Nazareth. Mrs. Lambert has gone to Lokeren with her husband in his car.