_9 October._--We have been all day in the train in very hard third-class carriages with the R.M.L.I. The journey of fifty miles took from 5 o'clock in the morning, when we got away, till 12 o'clock at night, when we reached Ostend. The train hardly crawled. It was the longest I have ever seen. All Ostend was in darkness when we arrived--a German airship having been seen overhead. We always seem to be tumbling about in the dark. We went from one hotel to another trying to get accommodation, and at last (at the St. James's) they allowed us to lie on the floor of the restaurant. The only food they had for us was ten eggs for twenty-five hungry people and some brown bread, but they had champagne at the house, and I ordered it for everybody, and we made little speeches and tried to end on a good note. _10 October._--Mrs. Stobart took the unit back to England to-day. The wounded were found in a little house which the Red Cross had made over to them, and Dr. Ramsey, Sister Bailey, and the two nurses had much to say about their perilous journey. One man had died on the road, but the others all looked well. Their joy at seeing us was pathetic, and there was a great deal of handshaking over our meeting. [Page Heading: THE UNIT RETURNS TO ENGLAND] Miss Donnisthorpe and I got decent rooms at the Littoral Hotel, and brought our luggage there, and had baths, which we much needed. Dr. Hanson had got out of the train at Bruges to bandage a wounded man, and she was left behind, and is still lost. I suppose she has gone home. She is the doctor I like best, and she is one of the few whose nerves are not shattered. It was a sorry little party which Mrs. Stobart took back to England. CHAPTER II WITH DR. HECTOR MUNRO'S FLYING AMBULANCE CORPS _12 October._--Everyone has gone back to England except Sister Bailey and me. She is waiting to hand over the wounded to the proper department, and I am waiting to see if I can get on anywhere. It does seem so hard that when men are most in need of us we should all run home and leave them. The noises and racket in Ostend are deafening, and there is panic everywhere. The boats go to England packed every time. I called on the Villiers yesterday, and heard that she is leaving on Tuesday. But they say that the British Minister dare not leave or the whole place would go wild with fear. Some ships lie close to us on the grey misty water, and the troops are passing along all day. _Later._--We heard to-night that the Germans are coming into Ostend to-morrow, so once more we fly like dust before a broom. It is horrible having to clear out for them. I am trying to discover what courage really consists in. It isn't only a lack of imagination. In some people it is transcendent, in others it is only a sort of stupidity. If proper precautions were taken the need for courage would be much reduced--the "tight place" is so often the result of sheer muddle.