The Story of the Red Cross as told to The Little Colonel | Page 7

to his duty.
"As I stood there gazing into the kind old face, I thought of the time
when I lay wounded on the field of battle. How glad I would have been
to have seen some dog like Barry come bounding to my aid! I had
fallen in a thicket, where the ambulance corps did not discover me until
next day. I lay there all that black night, wild with pain, groaning for
water. I could see the lanterns of the ambulances as they moved about
searching for the wounded among the many dead, but was too faint
from loss of blood to raise my head and shout for help. They told me
afterward that, if my wound could have received immediate attention,
perhaps my arm might have been saved.

"But only a keen sense of smell could have traced me in the dense
thicket where I lay. No one had thought of training dogs for ambulance
service then. The men did their best, but they were only men, and I was
overlooked until it was too late to save my arm.
"Well, as I said, I stood and looked at Barry, wondering if it were not
possible to train dogs for rescue work on battle-fields as well as in
mountain passes. The more I thought of it, the more my longing grew
to make such an attempt. I read everything I could find about trained
dogs, visited kennels where collies and other intelligent sheep-dogs
were kept, and corresponded with many people about it. Finally I went
to Coblenz, and there found a man who was as much interested in the
subject as I. Herr Bungartz is his name. He is now at the head of a
society to which I belong, called the German Society for Ambulance
Dogs. It has over a thousand members, including many princes and
generals.
"We furnish the money that supports the kennels, and the dogs are bred
and trained free for the army. Now for the last eight years it has been
my greatest pleasure to visit the kennels, where as many as fifty dogs
are kept constantly in training. It was on my last visit that I got Hero.
His leg had been hurt in some accident on the training field. It was
thought that he was too much disabled to ever do good service again, so
they allowed me to take him. Two old cripples, I suppose they thought
we were, comrades in misfortune.
"That was nearly a year ago. I took him to an eminent surgeon, told him
his history, and interested him in his case. He treated him so
successfully, that now, as you see, the leg is entirely well. Sometimes I
feel that it is my duty to give him back to the service, although I paid
for the rearing of a fine Scotch collie in his stead. He is so unusually
intelligent and well trained. But it would be hard to part with such a
good friend. Although I have had him less than a year, he seems very
much attached to me, and I have grown more fond of him than I would
have believed possible. I am an old man now, and I think he
understands that he is all I have. Good Hero! He knows he is a comfort
to his old master!"

At the sound of his name, uttered in a sad voice, the great dog got up
and laid his head on the Major's knee, looking wistfully into his face.
"Of co'se you oughtn't to give him back!" cried the Little Colonel. "If
he were mine, I wouldn't give him up for the president, or the emperor,
or the czar, or anybody!"
"But for the soldiers, the poor wounded soldiers!" suggested the Major.
Lloyd hesitated, looking from the dog to the empty sleeve above it.
"Well," she declared, at last, "I wouldn't give him up while the country
is at peace. I'd wait till the last minute, until there was goin' to be an
awful battle, and then I'd make them promise to let me have him again
when the wah was ovah. Just the minute it was ovah. It would be like
givin' away part of your family to give away Hero."
Suddenly the Major spoke to the dog--a quick, sharp sentence that
Lloyd could not understand. But Hero, without an instant's hesitation,
bounded from the courtyard, where they sat, into the hall of the hotel.
Through the glass doors she could see him leaping up the stairs, and,
almost before the Major could explain that he had sent him for the
shoulder-bags he wore in service, the dog was back with them grasped
firmly in his mouth.
"Now the flask," said the Major. While the dog obeyed the second
order, he opened