We came along a long, straight street, with verandahed houses standing
back in gardens, and trees partly shading the road, a ceaseless, slow,
living river of khaki; solid blocks of infantry, with measured, even
tread, the rifle barrels lightly rising and falling with the elastic,
easy motion that sways them altogether as the men keep time; cavalry,
regular and irregular, and, two by two, the rumbling guns. Mile after
mile of this steady, deliberate, muddy tide that has crept so far,
creeps on now through the Dutch capital. Look at the men! Through long
exposure and the weeding out of the weak ones, they are now all picked
men. The campaign has sorted them out, and every battalion is so much
solid gristle and sinew. They show their condition in their lean,
darkly-tanned faces; in the sinewy, blackened hands that grasp the rifle
butts; in the way they carry themselves, with shoulders well back and
heads erect, and in the easy, vigorous swing of their step.
I should like, while I am about it, to speak to you rather more at
length about the British soldier. I should think my time spent on
service, especially the five months in the ranks, time well spent, if
only for the acquaintanceship it has brought with soldiers. In the
field, on the march, in bivouac, I have met and associated and talked
with them on equal terms. Under fire and in action I have watched them,
have sat with them, long afternoons by rivers and under trees, and
yarned with them on tramps in the blazing sun.
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