l Boss: that sort of
action was, he considered, calculated to undermine authority.

I have had a long talk with Braithwaite _re_ this quandary. He strongly
holds that my first duty is to K. and that it is for us a question of K.
and no one but K. Were the S. of S. only a civilian (instead of being a
Field Marshal) the case _might_ admit of argument; as things are, it
does not. So have written the P.M. on these lines and shall send K. the
carbons of all my letters to him. To K. himself I have written backing
up my cable and begging for a Brigade of Gurkhas. Really, it is like
going up to a tiger and asking for a small slice of venison: I remember
only too well his warning not to make his position impossible by
pressing for troops, etc., but Egypt is not England; the Westerners
don't want the Gurkhas who are too short to fit into their trenches and,
last but not least, our landing is not going to be the simple,
row-as-you-please he once pictured. The situation in fact, is not in the
least what he supposed it to be when I started; therefore, I am
justified, I think, in making this appeal:--"I am very anxious, if
possible, to get a Brigade of Gurkhas, so as to complete the New Zealand
Divisional organisation with a type of man who will, I am certain, be
most valuable on the Gallipoli Peninsula. The scrubby hillsides on the
South-west face of the plateau are just the sort of terrain where those
little fellows are at their brilliant best. There is already a small
Indian commissariat attached to the Mountain Batteries, so there would
be no trouble on the score of supply."

"As you may imagine, I have no wish to ask for anything the giving of
which would seriously weaken our hold on Egypt, but you will remember
that four Mounted Brigades belonging to Birdwood's force are being left
behind to look after the land of the Pharaohs, and a Mounted Brigade for
a battalion seems a fair exchange. Egypt, in fact, so far as I can make
out, seems stiff with troops, and each little Gurkha might be worth his
full weight in gold at Gallipoli."

Wrote Fitz in much the same sense:--"We are desperately keen to extract
a Gurkha Brigade out of Egypt and you might lend a hand, not only to us,
but to all your own Sikh and Dogra Regiments, by making K. see that the
Indian Army was never given a dog's chance in the mudholes. They were
benumbed: _it was not their show_. Here, in the warm sun; pitted against
the hereditary _dushman_[9] who comes on sh