And He Was Not A Particularly Fastidious Sergeant Either, But
He Preferred A Damp Towel In His Roll To Damp Clothes On His Back.
Every Man Knows The Dreary Halts In Camp When The Rain Pours Outside,
Or The Regiment Is Held In Reserve.
For times like these a pack of
cards or a book is worth carrying, even if it weighs as much as the
plates from which it was printed.
At present it is easy to obtain
all of the modern classics in volumes small enough to go into the
coat-pocket. In Japan, before starting for China, we divided up
among the correspondents Thomas Nelson & Sons' and Doubleday, Page &
Co.'s pocket editions of Dickens, Thackeray, and Lever, and as most
of our time in Manchuria was spent locked up in compounds, they
proved a great blessing.
In the list I have included a revolver, following out the old saying
that "You may not need it for a long time, but when you do need it,
you want it damned quick." Except to impress guides and mule-
drivers, it is not an essential article. In six campaigns I have
carried one, and never used it, nor needed it but once, and then
while I was dodging behind the foremast it lay under tons of luggage
in the hold. The number of cartridges I have limited to six, on the
theory that if in six shots you haven't hit the other fellow, he will
have hit you, and you will not require another six.
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