y
co-mates and brothers in exile,' what I say is--you can get just as
drunk on 'four-'arf' as on champagne, and a lot cheaper. Ask my
honourable friend, Bear."

(Trooper Bear gave a realistic, but musical hiccup.)

"Also, to the Philosopher, bread-and-dripping is as interesting and
desirable prog as the voluble-varied heterogeny of the menu at the
Carlton or the Ritz--'specially when you've no choice."

"Hear, hear," put in Dam.

"Goatey ol' Goate!" said Trooper Bear with impressive solemnity. "Give
me your hand, Philossiler. I adore dripping. I'ss a (hic) mystery.
(No, I don' want both hands," as Goate offered his right to Bear's
warm embrace.) I'm a colliseur of Dripping. I understan' it. I
write odes to it. Yesh. A basin of dripping is like a Woman.
'Strornarillily. You never know what's beneath fair surface.... Below
a placid, level, unrevealing surface there may be--nothing ... and
there may be a rich deposit of glorious, stimulating, piquant
_essence_."

"Oh, shut up, Bear, and don't be an Ass," implored Trooper Burke
(formerly Desmond Villiers FitzGerald) ... "but I admit, all the same,
there's lots of worse prog in the Officers' Mess than a crisp crust
generously bedaubed with the rich jellified gravy that (occasionally)
lurks like rubies beneath the fatty soil of dripping."

"Sound plan to think so, anyway," agreed Trooper Little (_ci devant_
Man About Town and the Honourable Bertie Le Grand). "Reminds me of a
proverb I used to hear in Alt Heidelberg, _'What I have in my hand is
best'_."

"Qui' sho," murmured Trooper Bear with a seraphic smile, "an' wha' I
have in my 'place of departed _spirits_,' my tummy, is better. Glor'us
mixshure. Earned an honest penny sheven sheparate times cleaning the
'coutrements of better men ... _'an look at me for shevenpence'_ ..."
and he slept happily on Dam's shoulder.

In liquor, Trooper Bear was, if possible, gentler, kinder, and of
sweeter disposition than when sober; wittier, more hopelessly lovable
and disarming. These eight men--the "gentlemen-rankers" of the
Queen's Greys, made it a point of honour to out-Tommy "Tommy" as
troopers, and, when in his company, to show a heavier cavalry-swagger,
a broader accent, a quiffier "quiff," a cuttier cutty-pipe, a smarter
smartness; to groom a horse better, to muck out a stall better, to
scrub a floor better, to spring more smartly to attention or to a
disagreeable "fatigue," and to set an example of Tomminess from
turnin