SIC TRANSIT GLORIA.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1511, 14 February 1901, Page 60

SIC TRANSIT GLORIA.

Mr’Frederick Treves, the famous London surgeon, in his book on his experiences in Abuth Africa, has the following affecting sketch : —“I remember at C-hie-veiey one morning before breakfast watching a solitary man approach, the hospital lines. He was as melancholy an object as’ever War has produced. He was a soldier who had fought at Colenso, at Vaal Krautz, and before Pieters, and he was now staggering towards the hospital a ragged, broken-down khakicoloured spectre of a man. He dragged liis rule along with him ; his belt was gone; Iris helmet was poised at the back of his head ; lii-s frowsy tunic was tin-own ever his shoulders: he was literally black with Hies. His clothes had not been off Tor many days, and he had missed the ambulance, he said, and had walked to the hospital. How far he had come he could not tell, nor could anyone gather- how he had fared, or where he had slept; all that was evident- was that ho was wet with dew, and had spent the right in the open. He knew that for vague hours lie had been making his way, with ever faltering steps and failing eyes, towards the red crossflag on the crest of the hill. And now he had reached it- As to why he* iiad come, ‘Weil, ho had had a touch of dysentery,’ he said, 'and was about played out/ Poor lad! This was a sorry homecoming at the last, A squalid ending or a march ; staggering- in alone, m shuffling wreck without a single comrade, with no fifes and drums, no cheering crowd; an!?' no proud adoration of mother or'wife. He was helped to a belltent, and put to bed on a stretcher, and on i lie stretcher he died, and this was the end 1 of his soldiering. Sic transit gloria mundi.”