Then he described his time at the Duchess’ hospital.
"I thought I was with the Queen of the Fairies. We got everything we wanted without asking for it. When our fiancées were coming to see us, we were propped up with cushions to match the colour of our eyes. A fortnight before I could get up, they brought twelve brightly coloured dressing-gowns for me to choose which one I would wear the first time I was allowed out of bed. I chose a red and green one, which was hung up near me, and I was in such a hurry to put it on that I got well three days quicker. There was a Scotch captain with such a beautiful wife that all the patients’ temperatures went up when she came to see him. They ended by making a special door for her near her husband’s bed, so that she need not walk down the whole ward. Oh, I hope I shall be wounded soon! Doctor, promise to send me to the Duchess’ hospital!"
But Gibbons, with eyes still full of tender memories of home, would not be consoled. The padre, who was wise and kind, made him describe the last revue at the Palace, and complacently discussed the legs and shoulders of a "sweet little thing." The colonel got out his best records and played "Mrs. Finzi-Magrini" and "Destiny Waltz" to his guests. Gibbons sat with his head in his hands during the waltz. The colonel was going to chaff him mildly about his melancholy thoughts, but the little captain got up at the end of the tune and said:
The colonel and the padre agreed. Aurelle alone protested.
"Aurelle, my friend," said Dr. O’Grady, "if you want to be thought anything of amongst Englishmen, you must make yourself see their point of view. They don’t care for melancholy people, and have a contempt for sentiment. This applies to love as well as to patriotism and religion. If you want the colonel to despise you, stick a flag in your tunic. If you want the padre to treat you with contempt, give him a letter to censor full of pious rubbish; if you want to make Parker sick, weep over a photograph. They spend their youth hardening their skins and their hearts. They fear neither physical blows nor the blows of fate. They look upon exaggeration as the worst of vices, and coldness as a sign of aristocracy. When they are very miserable, they smile. When they are very happy, they say nothing at all. And _au fond_ John Bull is terribly sentimental, which explains everything."
