C.'s which, of course, they are continually
winning. In a war hospital that harbours many thousands of patients per
annum, we should know, in the long run, something about the
characteristics of Tommy Atkins; and it is with resentment that I hear
him thus classified as a mere type. He is not a type. Discipline and
training have given him some veneer of generalised similarities. Beneath
these, Tommy Atkins is simply the man in the street--any man in any
street; and if you look out of your window in the city and see a throng
of pedestrians upon the pavement you might just as well say that because
they are all civilians they are all alike as that, because all soldiers
wear khaki, they are all alike.
I have a quarrel with the Press on the score of its persistent fostering
of this notion that "our gallant lads" (as the sentimental scribe calls
them) are a pack of children about whose exploits an unfailing stream of
semi-pathetic, semi-humorous anecdotes must be put forth. Even the old
professional army exhibited no dead level either of blackguards on the
one hand or humble Galahads on the other.
Pages:
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77