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Page 5
"Bread and cheese for breakfast,
For dinner Army stew,
But when it comes to tea-time
There's dough and rind for you,
So you and me
Won't wait for tea--
We're jolly big fools if we do."
But those who do not live in billets, and whose worldly wealth fails
to exceed a shilling a day, must be content with Army rations, with
the tea tasting of coom, and seldom sweetened, with the pebble-studded
putty potato coated in clay, with the cheese that runs to rind at
last parade, and, above all, with the knowledge that they are merely
inconvenienced at home so that they may endure the better abroad.
There is another school of theorists that states that an army moves,
not upon its stomach, but upon its feet, the care of which is of vital
importance. This, too, finds confirmation in the official pamphlet,
which tells the soldier to "Remember that a dirty foot is an unsound
foot. See that feet are washed if no other part of the body is," etc.
My right foot had troubled me for days; a pain settled in the arch of
the instep, and caused me intense agony when resuming the march after
a short halt; at night I would suddenly awake from sleep to experience
the sensation of being stabbed by innumerable pins in ankle and toes.
Marching in future, I felt, would be a monstrous futility, and I
decided that my case was one for the medical officer.
Sick parade is not restricted by any dress order; the sore-footed
may wear slippers; the sore-headed, Balaclava helmets; puttees can be
discarded; mufflers and comforters may be used. "The sick rabble" is
the name given by the men to the crowd that waits outside the door of
the M.O.'s room at eight in the morning. And every morning brings its
quota of ailing soldiers; some seriously ill, some slightly, and a few
(as may be expected out of a thousand men of all sorts and conditions)
who have imaginary or feigned diseases that will so often save
"slackers" from a hard day's marching. The aim and ambition of these
latter seem to be to do as little hard work as possible; some of them
attend sick parade on an average once a week, and generally obtain
exemption from a day's work. To obtain this they resort to several
ruses; headaches and rheumatic pains are difficult to detect, and the
doctor must depend on the private's word; a quick pulse and heightened
temperature is engendered by a brisk run, and this is often a means
towards a favourable medical verdict--that is, when "favourable" means
a suspension of duties.
At a quarter to eight I stood with ten others in front of the M.O.'s
door, on which a white card with the blue-lettered "No Smoking"
stood out in bold relief. The morning was bitterly cold, and a sharp,
penetrating wind splashed with rain swept round our ears, and chilled
our hands and faces. One of the waiting queue had a sharp cough and
spat blood; all this was due, he told us, to a day's divisional
field exercise, when he had to lie for hours on the wet ground
firing "blanks" at a "dummy" enemy. Another sick soldier, a youth of
nineteen, straight as a lance and lithe as a poplar, suffered from
ulcer in the throat. "I had the same thing before," he remarked in a
thin, hoarse voice, "but I got over it somehow. This time it'll maybe
the hospital. I don't know."
An orderly corporal filled in admission forms and handed them to us;
each form containing the sick man's regimental number, name, religion,
age, and length of military service, in addition to several other
minor details having no reference at all to the matter in hand. These
forms were again handed over to another orderly corporal, who stood
smoking a cigarette under the blue-lettered notice pinned to the door.
The boy with the sore throat was sitting in a chair in the room when I
entered, the doctor bending over him. "Would you like a holiday?" the
M.O. asked in a kindly voice.
"Where to, sir?"
"A couple of days in hospital would leave you all right, my man," the
M.O. continued, "and it would be a splendid rest."
"I don't want a rest," answered the youth. "Maybe I'll be better in
the morning, sir."
The doctor thought for a moment, then:
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