against the proposition as such. That is the spirit of hut comradeship
... a spirit which no alarm-clock controversies can do aught to impair;
for though 5.15 a.m. is an hour to test the temper of a troop of
twenty-one saints, 10.15 p.m. will bring geniality and garrulousness to
twenty-one sinners.




III

WASHING-UP


The following substances (to which I had previously been almost a
stranger) absorbed much of my interest during my first months as a
hospital orderly:

Coagulated pudding, mutton fat and beef fat, cold gravy, treacle,
congealed cocoa, suet duff, skins of once hot milk:

Plates, cups, frying-pans and other utensils smeared with the above:

Knives, forks and spoons, ditto.

I am fated to go through life, in the future, not merely with an exalted
opinion of scullery-maids--this I should not regret--but also with an
only too clear picture, when at the dinner table, of the adventures of
each dish of broken meats on its exit from view. I have been behind the
scenes at the business of eating, or rather, at the dreadful repairs