| Description | Letter from Amelia Nyasa Laws, Hôpital Auxiliaire No. 10, Hotel Bristol, Aix-le-Bains, Savoie, France, to her relatives, thanking for letters which she will send on to Aunt and Uncle, though the Annecy frontier hampers correspondence; Aunt says they might move to Aix for September, so Amelia will take her Sunday walk past the hotels to see what they are like; Aunt Amy likes her new quarters; reference to news of the Esslemonts and of Miss Beilly; Lavier has had his stitches removed, though the surgeon treats the men as though they were still under chloroform; he sometimes undoes Amelia's good work by overstretching muscles; she has two new cases, Métral and Rouard, both with shoulder and arm wounds; Monday was disrupted by a General's inspection; she was presented to him but was rather embarrassed by it; movements between wards; Bastille Day disrupted everything further as men and nurses were excited; there was a concert in the park which most of the walking wounded and others attended; some of the patients put on entertainments for each other even when bedridden; it is a good atmosphere though occasionally too noisy for those just recovering from an operation; Favergeon, Breuils and another patient received decorations from a commandant, himself on crutches; Favergeon has lost a leg and Breuils has internal injuries; the commandant was quite emotional; Favergeon received the Médaille de Guerre and the Croix de Guerre; he is a happy-go-lucky type; courage is hard to judge when it costs different things to different men; the doctor does not understand that muscles that work under chloroform can be tensed and damaged when the patient is conscious, or can be wasted with inactivity and not bear weight. |