The next day when I arrived she told me that she had caught the young man scraping the wound on his finger with his knife. I called him and told him that I should have to report this to the Val-de-Grâce Hospital. He began to weep and vowed to me that he would never do it again, and five days later he was well. I signed the paper authorizing him to leave the _ambulance_, and he was sent to the army of the defense. I often wondered what became of him. Another of our patients bewildered us, too. Each time that his wound seemed to be just on the point of healing up, he had a violent attack of dysentery which threw him back. This seemed suspicious to Dr. Duchesne, and he asked me to watch the man. At the end of a considerable time, we were convinced that our wounded man had thought out the most comical scheme. He slept next the wall and therefore had no neighbor on the one side. During the night, he managed to file the brass of his bedstead. He put the filings in a little pot which had been used for ointment of some kind. A few drops of water and some salt mixed with this powdered brass formed a poison, which might have cost its inventor his life. I was furious at this stratagem. I wrote to the Val-de-Grâce, and an _ambulance_ conveyance was sent to take this unpatriotic Frenchman away. But side by side with these despicable men, what heroism we saw! A young captain was brought in one day. He was a tall fellow, a regular Hercules, with a superb head, and a frank expression. On my book he was described as Captain Menesson. He had been struck by a bullet at the top of the arm, just at the shoulder. With a nurse’s assistance I was trying as gently as possible to take off his cloak, when three bullets fell from the hood which he had pulled over his head, and I counted sixteen bullet holes in the cloak. The young officer had stood upright for three hours, serving as a target himself, while covering the retreat of his men as they fired all the time on the enemy. This had taken place among the Champigny vines. He had been brought in unconscious in a hospital conveyance. He had lost a great deal of blood, and was half dead with fatigue and weakness. He was very gentle and charming, and thought himself sufficiently well two days later to return to the fight. The doctor, however, would not allow this, and his sister, who was a nun, besought him to wait until he was something like well again. “Oh, not quite well,” she said, smiling; “but just well enough to have strength to fight.” Soon after he came into the _ambulance_ the Cross of the Legion of Honor was brought for him, and this was a moment of intense emotion for everyone. The unfortunate wounded men who could not move turned their suffering faces toward him and, with their eyes shining through a mist of tears, gave him a fraternal look. The more convalescent among them held out their hands to the young giant.