A HOSPITAL ROMANCE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1630, 28 October 1916, Page 4

A HOSPITAL ROMANCE.

At (he Dudley Load Hospital, in the \v;ird appropriated to the New Zealanders, one of tin* despera 1 e cases w;is ;i niiin wlio appeared well over militiiry age, ami exhibited no great anxiety to get heller. Conditions were, therefore, heavily againsl the doctors. Visitors learned hut little about hint, except that lie had no friends. Many years ago he had quarrelled with his father and mother, had gone out to New Zealand, had prospered, ami soon after the war broke out got himself accepted for military service. Some ten years before, desiring' reconciliation with his people, he had written to a friend asking their whereabouts, and had been shocked to learn of their death a short time before. Wounded in France, he was brought to the Birmingham hospital, and for a long time remained there in a precarious condition. His neighbours in the ward changed many limes, but one who stayed longer than the others managed to break down his reserve and learned the man’s story. Pie detailed if to his neighbour on the other side, and this man came from the New Zealander's native village. He had known the father and mother slightly, and his recollection was not that they had died, but that they had moved some distance away to another village. He had heard that they were living only a very short lime before. He made enquiries, and found (hat the oh) people, both over 70, were still alive, and residing ju.-i below London. The doctor was consulted, and, believing that joy never kills, (old the New Zealander. From that point the patient stubbornly won back to recovery, and a few days ago was sufficiently convalescent to visit his parents in their own home. The friend who had apprised him of their death explained that when on a visit to the village be had enquired for the old people, and he had been told that they had “gone,” and assumed the long journey ‘‘west,” instead of a 20-mile trek to another village.