Barbara and I discovered that both of us have birthdays in March--only six days apart. This put us at once on a footing of intimacy--we must have been born under the same star. Barbara proceeded to inform me that she rather liked birthdays--except the one which happened in Egypt. I had half a mind to execute a deed of conveyance on the spot, assigning to her all my own birthdays as an estate _pour autre vie_, with all _profits a prendre_ and presents arising therefrom, for I am thirty-eight and have no further use for them. "I am afraid there are more than six years between us, Barbara," I said pensively. Barbara regarded me closely with large round eyes. "About ten, I fink. I'm seven, you know." "How nice of you to say that, Barbara. Then I'm only seventeen." Barbara regarded me still more closely. "A little more, p'waps--ten monfs." "Thank you, Barbara. I'll remind you of that some day." After all, ten years is no obstacle to the course of true love. "But what is the matter with the doll?" Despite a rosy flush the doll has a field-dressing round her auburn locks, and one leg is immensely stout owing to a tourniquet. Barbara looked at me rather less favourably than before. It was evident that she now thought poorly of my intelligence, and that I had made a _faux pas_. "I'm a nurse," Barbara explained, loftily, showing an armlet bearing the ensign of the Red Cross. I was about to remind her of 1 & 2 Geo. V. cap. 20, which threatens the penalties of a misdemeanour against all who wear the Red Cross without the authority of Army Council, but I thought better of it. Instead of anything so foolish, I exhibit a delicate solicitude about the health of the patient. I put myself right by referring to it as "he." A less intelligent observer might pronounce it to be decidedly of the female sex. Still, I reflected, women have enlisted in the Army before now. I proceeded to inspect the injured limb with professional gravity. "A compound fracture, I think, Barbara. He will require careful nursing." Barbara liked this--no one in the matron's room had ever exhibited such a clinical interest in the case before, and she thinks "fwacture" rather imposing. "Let me feel his pulse," I said. I held a waxen arm between my thumb and forefinger, and looked at my wrist-watch for some seconds, Barbara gazing at me intently. "Hum! hum! I think we had better take his temperature," I said, as I held a clinical thermometer in the shape of a fountain-pen to the rosebud lips of the patient. "103, I think." "Will you wite a pwescwiption?" asked Barbara anxiously. "Certainly, an admirable suggestion, Barbara. Let me see, will this do, do you think?" I scribbled on my Field Note-book, tore out the page, and handed it to Barbara. Brom. Potass. 3 grs. Hydrochl. 5 quarts. Quin. Sulph. 1 pt.