[Illustration: _Geordie_. "WELL, AH'M BLOWED! THEY'M NAMED YON PLAACE
AFTER T'OWD DOOG-OUT ON T' SOMME!"]

* * * * *

THE SUBALTERNS' PARADISE.

I met Bilsden and congratulated him on being in "civvies."

"What are you going to do now?" I asked. "Back to the old firm?"

"No," said Bilsden gravely; "when a man has acquired the power of
leading men he's thrown away in an accountant's office, especially as
the junior member of the staff. I see no prospect in England. I have
offered to take charge of large departments of English firms, and be
responsible for entire supervision, but they fail to recognise what
the capacity for leadership gained in the army will do. I'm off to
Ceylon--tea-planting. Just to control big gangs of coolies and see
that they work. It will be child's play for me. Lovely climate;
elephants. An absolutely ideal job."

It seemed to me on that foggy frosty day, that to lie in a hammock in
the shade, with the temperature about ninety, watching coolies work,
would be the perfect form of labour.

I congratulated Bilsden on having found his _métier_.

Half-an-hour later I met Parkinson, another second-loot who had just
shed his pip.