The tone of "In Another Country" is sanguine, or hopeful. The speaker of the story feels rather optimistic, despite all the pain and suffering around him. Even during the war, the speaker notices the electric lights that come on along the streets in winter as well as the snow on the foxes’ fur as the wind blows their tails. He also remarks that the hospital, a place filled with pain and injured people, is old and beautiful. When the speaker sees the major’s hand, he thinks it looks like a baby’s hand. These appreciative reflections during a war suggest that the speaker is hopeful. The speaker’s tone, then, lets readers see the war in a less gruesome light.
"In Another Country" is a short story by American author Ernest Hemingway.
It is about an ambulance corps member in Milan during World War I. Although unnamed, he is assumed to be "Nick Adams" a character Hemingway made to represent himself. He has an injured knee and visits a hospital daily for rehabilitation. There the "machines" are used to speed the healing, with the doctors making much of the miraculous new technology. They show pictures to the wounded of injuries like theirs healed by the machines, but the war-hardened soldiers are portrayed as skeptical, perhaps justifiably so.
