ving the handkerchief from his
eyes, and with a perfectly solemn face, B.-P. explained that he had
just at that moment tumbled out of his nurse's arms and that the silly
woman had gone on without noticing it. And the other story: being told
rather rudely at a picture exhibition in Manchester that he must go
back to the hall and leave his stick with the porter, B.-P. walked
briskly away, but presently returned, with his stick, hobbling
painfully along--a man to whom a walking-stick was veritably a staff
of life. The rude official bit his lip and looked the other way.

When the regiment was at Muttra, Baden-Powell lived in a house which
boasted a very large compound, and this he dignified by the name of
"Bloater Park." At that time it was the habit to speak about men as
"this old bloater" and "that old bloater," and the expression so
tickled B.-P. that he adopted the name for his lordly compound.
Letters would actually reach him from England solemnly addressed to
Bloater Park.

Life at this time--if we except the 1887 operations against Dinizulu
in Africa, when B.-P. was Assistant Military Secretary, and commanded
a column in attack--was for the most part humdrum, and only enlivened
by theatricals and shooting expeditions. But B.-P. was ever interested
in his men, and planned sports and entertainments for them, which
always kept him fully occupied. A friend of his going to call on him
in Seaforth, where B.-P. was commanding a squadron, was astonished to
find a Maypole in the centre of the dingy barrack square, round which
mounted men rode merrily, each with a coloured ribbon in his hand. On
questioning the commander, the visitor discovered that there was a
deserving charity in Liverpool, and that B.-P. was getting up a
military display on its behalf.

Before leaving this subject, let us mention that Baden-Powell was
Brigade-Major to the Heavy Brigade at the Jubilee Review of 1887, that
he was sent by Lord Wolseley to arrange about machine guns for cavalry
use at Aldershot, that he was Secretary to the British Commission at
Swaziland in 1888, and in the same year was elected a member of the
United States Cavalry Association. One of his most important staff
appointments was that of Assistant Military Secretary to the Governor
of Malta, where his work for the amelioration of the soldiers' and
sailors' lives produced lasting benefits.

His work as a regimental officer will be more fully dealt with in a
later chapter.