cience of duty done and
recognition earned floating like a halo above it. For the moment
memories of Nightmare Wood and the Kidney Bean Redoubt--more
especially the latter--were effaced. Even the sorrowful gaps in the
ring round the table seemed less noticeable.

The menu, too, was almost pretentious. First came the _hors
d'oeuvres_--a tin of sardines. This was followed by what the
Mess Corporal described as a savoury omelette, but which the
Second-in-Command condemned as "a regrettable incident."

"It is false economy," he observed dryly to the Mess President, "to
employ Mark One [1] eggs as anything but hand-grenades."

[Footnote 1: In the British army each issue of arms or equipment
receives a distinctive "Mark." Mark I denotes the earliest issue.]

However, the tide of popular favour turned with the haggis,
contributed by Lieutenant Angus M'Lachlan, from a parcel from home.
Even the fact that the Mess cook, an inexperienced aesthete from
Islington, had endeavoured to tone down the naked repulsiveness of the
dainty with discreet festoons of tinned macaroni, failed to arouse
the resentment of a purely Scottish Mess. The next course--the beef
ration, hacked into the inevitable gobbets and thinly disguised by a
sprinkling of curry powder--aroused no enthusiasm; but the unexpected
production of a large tin of Devonshire cream, contributed by Captain
Bobby Little, relieved the canned peaches of their customary
monotony. Last of all came a savoury--usually described as _the_
savoury--consisting of a raft of toast per person, each raft carrying
an abundant cargo of fried potted meat, and provided with a passenger
in the shape of a recumbent sausage.

A compound of grounds and dish-water, described by the optimistic Mess
Corporal as coffee, next made its appearance, mitigated by a bottle of
Cointreau and a box of Panatellas; and the Mess turned itself to more
intellectual refreshment. A heavy and long-overdue mail had been found
waiting at St. Gregoire. Letters had been devoured long ago. Now, each
member of the Mess leaned back in his chair, straightened his weary
legs under the table, and settled down, cigar in mouth, to the perusal
of the _Spectator_ or the _Tatler_, according to rank and literary
taste.

Colonel Kemp, unfolding a week-old _Times_, looked over his glasses at
his torpid disciples.

"Where is young Sandeman?" he inquired.

Young Sandeman was the Adjutant.

"He went out to the Orderly Room, sir,