wondering whether you are going to beat your previous record and get
six instead of five, the bugle blows and immediately throws you into a
state of great indecision. The problem is whether to finish the
hammock and be reported late for muster or to attend muster and be
reported for not having finished your hammock. The time spent in
considering this problem usually results in your trying to do both and
in failing to accomplish either, getting reported on two counts. Any
enlisted man is entitled to play this game and he is sure of making a
score. After running around innumerable miles of early morning camp
scenery and losing several buttons from your new trousers, you come
back and do Greek dances for a man who aspires to become a second
Mordkin or a Mr. Isadora Duncan. This is all very sweet and I am sure
the boys play prettily together. First he dances, then we dance; then
he interprets a bird and we all flutter back at him. This being done
to his apparent satisfaction, we proceed to crawl and grind and weave
and wave in a most extraordinary manner. This is designed to give us
physical poise to enable us to go aloft in a graceful and pleasing
manner. After this dancing in the dew you return for a few more rounds
with your hammock, clean up your bay and stand in line for breakfast.
After breakfast we muster again and a gentleman talks to us in a voice
that would lead you to believe that he thought we were all in hiding
somewhere in New Rochelle. Then there are any number of things to do
to divert our minds--scrub hammocks, pick up cigarettes, drill, hike
and attend lectures. As a rule we do all of these things. From 5 p.m.
until 8:45 p.m. if we are unfortunate enough not to have a lecture
party we are free to give ourselves over to the riotous joy of the
moment, which consists of listening to a phonograph swear bitterly at
a piano long past its prime. The final act of the drama of the day is
performed on the hammock--an animated little sketch of arms and legs
conducted along the lines of Houdini getting into a strait-jacket, or