One thought of the awful winter it had passed through, when dead and
dying had lain about the streets. Typhus, relapsing fever, and typhoid
had gripped the town. Lady Paget's staff, while grappling with the
trouble, had paid a heavy toll, as their hospital lay deep on the
unhealthy part of the city. For a time the citadel was in the hands of
an English unit. Before they were there it was a Serbian hospital, and
the staff threw all the dirty, stained dressings over the cliff, down
which they rolled to the road. The peasants used to collect these
pestiferous morsels and made them into padded quilts. Little wonder that
illness spread! In the summer Lady Paget's hospital withdrew to some
great barracks on the hill. The paths were made of Turkish tombstones,
which were always used in Uskub for road metal.
The hospital staff was saddened by the recent death of Mr. Chichester,
who had, like ourselves, just returned from a tour in the western
mountains, where he caught paratyphoid and only lived a few days.
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