any handbook devotes even a sub-paragraph to light and leading upon
certain points which we have here to consider every day. For example,
if a subaltern glissading on ski down the village street, maintaining
his precarious balance by the aid of a "stick" in each hand, meets
a General, also on ski and also a novice, what should happen? What
_does_ happen we know by demonstration: the subaltern brandishes both
sticks round his head, slides forward five yards, smartly crosses the
points of his ski and then, plunging forward, buries his head in the
wayside drift, while the General Officer sits down and says what he
thinks. But we do not know if these gestures of natural courtesy are
such as our mentors would approve. No authority has set up for us any
ideal in such matters. From official rules of deportment the British
soldier knows how to salute when on foot or mounted on bicycle, horse,
mule, camel, elephant, motor-lorry or yak, but no provision has been
made for the case of an army scooting on ski. So here we are at large
in the Arctic Circle, coping with new conditions by the light of
nature, and paying such perilous "compliments" to senior officers as
our innate courtesy and sense, of balance suggest and permit.

Further, consider the question of dress. Even the gunners, who in the
late war used to wear riding-breeches of their favourite colour, no
matter what it was, the kind of footgear they most fancied, and any
old variety of hat they thought becoming, are shocked by the fantastic
kit that is countenanced in this latitude. It must be borne in mind
that most of us are old campaigners and old nomads whose tailors have
grown accustomed to build us appropriate gear for various climes.
Fashions for fighting in France, in Egypt, in Mesopotamia, have gained
a hold upon our affections, to say nothing of those designs for civil
breadwinning or moss-dodging in Central Africa, Bond Street, Kirkcaldy
or Dawson City. The consequence is that here, pretty well out of