RUSSIAN RED CROSS

WAIMATE DOCTOR'S WORK PITIFUL SCENES AT HOSPITAL. Serving with the Russian Red Crose at Lemberg, Galicia., ia Dr. H. C. Barclay, of Waimate, Canterbury. R-ecfently The Post had news of Dr. Barclay's arrival at Petrograd and his reception by the Empress-Dowager of Eussia. The I Waimate Advertiser contains extract* from correspondence giving the doctor* experience at the Russian base hospital at Lemberg. Writing on 14th September, Dr. Barclay describes the baee hospital which has been established in the, magnificent infantry barracks of tho Austrian Cadets. "Things are lively around us to-day," lie writes. "The Poles and Jews in the town have re- | volted, and firing and bombs are going off ad lib. You would be amused whilb unpicking seaweed for making pillows, and helping to cut macintosh cloth for draw-sheets, to pause for a moment's rest, just to judge the distance of tlie last burst of rifle shots. It adds great zest to, existence. Under the circum- | stances we are arming for self-protec-tion, a« the Red Cross is not necessarily very sacred in a town fight." Describing the hospital work, Dr. Barclay says there are only two operative surgeons on the staff, with an anesthetist and a physician. "We have four tables going in the operating-room, sometimes from 9 a-m. till dark, but always till 2 p.m. And really I pity many a man , T wish he had died in the trenches and so, poor devil, must he. It gets too much for me. Many cases J put on the tables' by the physicians get I no anaesthetics, and to operate amid the hideous wails and the occasional screams of others is distressing beyond measure. Most of the # cases we are dealing with now have laid for a fortnight with compound, fractures soaked in decomposing matter, with dressings unchanged, and present pictures of misery and loathsomeness hard to realise. There is no use trying to save most of the limbs. Off they nave to come. But they are luckier really than those we try to save, for the agony of changing dressings and splints and attempting to straighten their limbs is much greater tha,n the suspense or fear in the firing line. Many, I have no doubt, wish themselves dead. But the Russian soon recovers his equi- ■ librium. His capacity for good humour and cheerfulness is unbounded, and half an hour afterwards in the ward, the screaming poor beggar of the operating table is making a cigarette, and all smiles, and-— yes — and sometimes, even grateful." When those men who could be moved were evacuated they expressed their gratitude in touching manner to the New Zealand surgeon.. For some time it was feared that the Russians would have to retire from Lemberg 1 ; and preparations were made /or moving the hospital equipment and patients. When it was thought that the Austrian army was approaching, the politeness of the inhabitants ot the town fell to zero, and occasional revolver shooting became fashionable again,, one of the nurses nar* rowly escaping a bullet. Not speaking Russian, Dr. Barclay cannot converge with his patients ; but he has managed to find two little Austrian children whose father was recalled from New York for the army, and they help him with some of the\ .languages, fpr there are at least three — Polish, (Jerman, and Russian—ia general use.