the War Office, of whom I formed one myself.
Instigated thereunto by that gushing fountain of unimpeachable
information, the Press, the public were during the early part of the
war disposed to attribute all high crimes and misdemeanours, of which
the central administration of the nation's military forces was
pronounced to have been guilty, to the "dug-out." That the personnel
of the War Office was always set out in detail at the beginning of the
_Monthly Army List_, the omniscient Fourth Estate was naturally aware;
but the management of a newspaper could hardly be expected to purchase
a copy (it was not made confidential for a year). Nor could a
journalistic staff condescend to study this work of reference at some
library or club. Under the circumstances, and having heard that such
people as "dug-outs" actually existed, the Press as a matter of course
assumed that within the portals in Whitehall Lord Kitchener was
struggling in vain against the ineptitude and reactionary tendencies
of a set of prehistoric creatures who constituted the whole of his
staff. The fact, however, was that all the higher appointments (with
scarcely an exception other than that of myself) were occupied by
soldiers who had been on the active list at the time of mobilization,
and the great majority of whom simply remained at their posts after
war was declared.

Nor were "dug-outs," whether inside or outside of the War Office, by
necessity and in obedience to some inviolable rule individuals
languishing in the last stage of mental and bodily decay. Some of them
were held to be not too effete to bear their burden even amid the
stress and turmoil of the battlefield. One, after serving with
conspicuous distinction in several theatres of war, finished up as
Chief of the General Staff and right-hand man to Sir Douglas Haig in
1918. Those members of the band who were at my beck and call within
the War Office generally contrived to grapple effectually with
whatever they undertook, and amongst them certainly not the least
competent and interesting was a Rip Van Winkle, whom we will call
"Z"--for short.

A subaltern at the start, "Z" was fitted out with all the virtues of
the typical subaltern, but was furnished in addition with certain
virtues that the typical subaltern does not necessarily possess. It
could not be said of him that

deep on his brow engraven
Deliberation sat and sovereign care,

but he treated Cabin