organization that had been brought into being in two years that it
seemed to run without any apparent effort on his part. The methods of
men who have great authority interest us all. I had first seen Sir
William at a desk in a little room of a house in a French town when his
business was that of transport and supply for the British Expeditionary
Force. Then he moved to a larger room in the same town, as Chief of
Staff of the army in France. Now he had a still larger one and in
London.

I had heard much of his power of application, which had enabled him to
master languages while he was gaining promotion step by step; but I
found that the new Chief of Staff of the British Army was not "such a
fool as ever to overwork," as one of his subordinates said, and no
slave to long hours of drudgery at his desk.

"Besides his routine," said another subordinate, speaking of Sir
William's method, "he has to do a great deal of thinking." This passing
remark was most illuminating. Sir William had to think for the whole. He
had trained others to carry out his plans, and as former head of the
Staff College who had had experience in every branch, he was supposed to
know how each branch should be run.

When I returned to the front, my first motor trip which took me along
the lines of communication revealed the transformation, the more
appreciable because of my absence, which the winter had wrought. The New
Army had come into its own. And I had seen this New Army in the making.
I had seen Kitchener's first hundred thousand at work on Salisbury Plain
under old, retired drillmasters who, however eager, were hazy about
modern tactics. The men under them had the spirit which will endure the
drudgery of training. With time they must learn to be soldiers. More raw