The work cannot be called difficult. It would be
an exaggeration to say that it demands a supreme intellectual effort.
But to the male mind it is, at least, rather novel. The average bachelor
has perhaps been accustomed to scrutinise his collars, handkerchiefs and
underclothes before and after their trips to the laundry. He has seldom,
I think, had intimate trafficking with pillow-cases, sheets,
counterpanes and tablecloths. In the reckoning of these he is apt to
make mistakes and to lapse into a casualness which, in a woman familiar
with household routine, would be improbable. "Sister's" sharpest
reproofs were called forth by errors made in connection with this daily
exchange of clean for dirty linen.
A form, of course, had to be filled in. (The army provides a form
for everything.) This form presents a catalogue of eighty-one
separate items, from "Blankets" ("Child's," "Infant's"--I do not
know what is the difference between them, and I never had to deal with
either--"G.S."--whatever that may be--and "White") to "Waist-coats,
Strait." It distinguishes between ten kinds of "Cases"--pillow-cases,
paillasse-cases, and the like: for example, there are "barrack"
bolster-cases and "hospital" bolster-cases; and you must not confound
"hospital" mattress-cases with "officers'" mattress-cases.
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