tera scripta manet_--which has been explained by an A.S.C. sergeant,
instructing a class of potential officers, as meaning "Never do anything
without a written order, but, whatever you do, never write one." For an
A.S.C. court of inquiry has as impassioned a preference for written over
oral evidence as the old Court of Chancery. So that if your way-bill
testifies:

Truck No. Contents
19414 Jam 36 x 50

and from the thirty-six cases of fifty pots one pot of jam is missing on
arrival at rail-head, then, though truck 19414 arrived sealed and your
labels undefaced, it will go hard with you as Train Officer unless you
can produce that pot.

For the feeding of the Army is a delicate business and complicated. It
is not enough to secure that there be sufficient "caloric units" in the
men's rations; there are questions of taste. The Brahmin will not touch
beef; the Mahomedan turns up his nose at pork; the Jain is a vegetarian;
the Ghurkha loves the flesh of the goat. And every Indian must have his
ginger, garlic, red chilli, and turmeric, and his chupattis of
unleavened bread. One such warehouse we entered and beheld with
stupefaction mountainous boxes of ghee and hogsheads of goor, rice,
dried apricots, date-palms, and sultanas. Storekeepers in turbans stood
round us, who, being asked whether it was well with the Indian and his
food, answered us with a great shout, like the Ephesians, "Yea, the
exalted Government hath done great things and praised be its name." To
which we replied "Victory to the Holy Ganges water." Their lustrous eyes
beamed at the salutation.

Great, indeed, is the Q.M.G. He supplies manna in the wilderness, and
like the manna of the Israelites it has never been known to fail. It is
of him that the soldier in the trenches says, in the words of the
prophet, "He hath filled my belly with his delicates." And his caravans
cover the face of the earth. You meet them everywhere, each Supply
Column a self-contained unit like a fleet. It has its O.C., its cooks,
its seventy-two motor lorries, with three men to each, and its "mobiles"
or travelling workshops with dynamo, lathe, drilling machine, and a crew
of skilled artificers, ready to tackle any motor-lorry that is put out
of action. I take off my hat to those handy-men; many times have they
helped me out of a tight place and performed delicate operations on the
internal organs of my military car in the inhospitable night. It is a