Suppose that at three in the afternoon Jock is hit, in the front trench.
'Jock' is the name universally given to Scottish soldiers, Lowland or
Highland. It is not a melodious name, but there it is! And it somehow
expresses the Scotsman's character better than 'Tommy' does. He cannot
be carried down the communication trench because it zigzags too much:
he cannot be got round the angles. So he is taken into a dug-out and
gets first aid, and a tablet of morphine perhaps. The M.O. may possibly
come up to see him, but he may be too busy in his own aid-post. There
are stretcher bearers in the trench able to bandage properly. The
average 'S.B.,' by the way, is a man from the battalion, not from the
R.A.M.C. As soon as it is dark the stretcher bearers lift him and carry
him across the open to the aid-post, which is perhaps five hundred or a
thousand yards behind the firing trench, near the battalion
headquarters. It is an eerie journey, with a certain amount of risk. The
brilliant Boche flares rise continually--the enemy is sometimes called
'the Hun,' more often 'the Boche,' in more genial moments 'Fritz,' but
'the Germans' never--and light up the ground vividly.
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